Alert cop pulls girl from death's door at Lonavla station

PUNE: A quick-thinking police constable on Sunday morning saved a girl from certain death at the Lonavla railway station.
The girl had fallen from the platform when a speeding Mumbai-Kakinada express train was leaving the station. The alert constable, Pawan Tayade, saved the girl from getting crushed under the wheels of the train.
Police inspector Chandrakant Jadhav of Lonavla city police said Tayade was assigned bandobast duty at the railway station as many people were expected to gather there with plans to go to Pune for the Maratha Kranti Morcha.“It was during this time that he saved the girl,“ he said. Recalling the incident, Tayade said, “Around 9.35 am, I saw a girl suddenly slip on the platform, with both her legs going over the edge.She managed to break her fall by grabbing at the platform surface,“ he said.
With barely a thought, Tayade ran towards her and pulled her to safety. Thanking the constables, the girl walked away , shaken but safe. According to Tayade, who is posted with the Lonavla city police station, it later came to light that the girl, who alighted from a local train at the station, was searching for a toilet when the Mumbai-Kakinada Express halted briefly at the station.
The girl got on the train to use the on-board facility . Before she could safely get off however, the train moved, resulting in her scary fall.
The incident was recorded by the station's CCTV cameras and has since gone viral.Actor Akshay Kumar, in a tweet, said: “Had my heart in my mouth literally! Salute to constable Pawan Tayde of Lonavla police station for his presence of mind and swift action.“
In the video, an unidentified man is seen first jumping off the fast-moving train, and falling to the ground after losing his footing. A fraction later, the girl jumped off, immediately slipped and got pulled off the platform by the onward motion of the train.Tayade rushed to her rescue just as she got sucked into the gap between the platform and the train, and pulled her to safety.
Following this close call, Government Railway Police has appealed to people to not endanger their lives in this manner. This is the second such instance in two days of good Samaritans saving someone's life. On Saturday , three women had come to the rescue of a young girl who had lost control of her vehicle and come under the wheels of a stationary bus in the city .
Getting out of their vehicle and cutting through a mob of almost 70 bystanders, the three women saw two men helping a girl out from under a stationary bus.
The girl, an architectural intern Smarta Khobragade (22), was badly injured and in trauma. Apart from a few cuts on her head and knees, not much bleeding was visible.
As the rest of the crowd simply chose to stand and gape, some even getting into the very bus involved to get a better view, the girls and three men carefully carried Khobragade to the car and drove to Shashwat Hospital in Aundh. There a team of doctors immediately attended to Khobragade.