Lucknow:
The death toll in Tuesday's train mishap in Uttar Pradesh has gone up to 18 as four people, who were injured, died in a hospital on Wednesday morning.
Fourteen young men, travelling atop the Himgiri Express, were killed when they were hit by an overbridge near Shahjahanpur on Tuesday. The train was crammed with job aspirants returning from an Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) recruitment camp in Bareilly in UP.
Agitated over the death of the youths, the job aspirants ran amok at Shahjahanpur station torching two bogies of the Jammu-Tawi Express and manhandling the driver of the Himgiri train.
On Wednesday morning, the young men broke down a door at a cantonment station in Varanasi.
Uttar Pradesh Special DGP Brij Lal told PTI in Lucknow that the youths were killed when they fell from the Himgiri Express near Roja station, barely four-km from Shahjahanpur railway station.
Some trains were cancelled and diverted in view of the accidents.
Over 1.5 lakh youths from 11 states, vying for ITBP jobs, had reached Bareilly to submit forms for recruitment in the force.
Earlier in the day, thousands of ITBP aspirants went on a rampage in Bareilly torching a number of vehicles after they failed to submit their forms due to alleged mismanagement of the authorities. They set ablaze seven buses, five of them belonging to the state roadways, some two-wheelers and a petrol pump, officials said.
The agitating youths also pelted stones at AIR and Doordarshan offices.
The incidents set off a blame-game between the Centre and Uttar Pradesh authorities. Home Minister P Chidambaram said the ITBP had informed the state police "well in advance" but the state police provided only "minimal forces".
"These were done with the full knowledge and consent of state police. After all we are recruiting boys from that state only," Chidambaram said. (With PTI Inputs)