KARACHI, April 14: The Pakistan Railways police baton-charged a crowd at the cantonment railway station and arrested 14 people for disturbing law and order and trying to travel without tickets. A police official said that people gathered at the station tried to get on trains without having valid tickets since their reservations had been cancelled for technical reasons. The police had to baton-charge the unruly crowd arresting some 14 people.

However, a senior railway official said that technical fault had developed in some bogies and the railway had to cancel 110 seats. The seats were not cancelled on political grounds, he asserted. “We have refunded the amount of the tickets to the intending travellers,” he added.

A number of people on a call of the Pakistan People’s Party had gathered at the cantonment station. They had already made seat reservations; however, they came to know at the station that their seats had been cancelled.

The chief of the Pakistan Railways Workers Union, Manzoor Razi, strongly criticized the cancellation of tickets and schedule of special trains, which were to leave from Sukkur and Rohri for Lahore, causing a loss of Rs2.7 million to the Pakistan Railways.

The cancellation of special trains and tickets had inflicted a huge loss on the Pakistan Railways.