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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Mumbai local train murder stuns commuters

Mumbai: A routine commute to home on a dark rain-soaked night in a Mumbai local turned into a nightmare when a 22-year-old commuter was allegedly stabbed to death inside a first-class compartment following a heated argument over shutting the train door, late on Tuesday. The victim, identified as Mayank Lohar, 22, worked as a salesman with a private company in Andheri and lived in Virar, nearly 60 km from Churchgate. According to Western Railway (WR) and Government Railway Police (GRP)...

Mumbai local train murder stuns commuters

Mumbai: A routine commute to home on a dark rain-soaked night in a Mumbai local turned into a nightmare when a 22-year-old commuter was allegedly stabbed to death inside a first-class compartment following a heated argument over shutting the train door, late on Tuesday. The victim, identified as Mayank Lohar, 22, worked as a salesman with a private company in Andheri and lived in Virar, nearly 60 km from Churchgate. According to Western Railway (WR) and Government Railway Police (GRP) officials, the shocking incident took place aboard the Churchgate-Nalasopara Fast Local (Train No. 90663), which left Churchgate at 10.05 pm and reached Andheri at 10.42 pm. As the train pulled out of Andheri, heavy rains started lashing the city. Lohar reportedly requested a fellow commuter standing near the doorway to shut the door, as rainwater was blowing into the compartment and inconveniencing those seated inside. The other commuter, wearing a dark shirt and trousers, allegedly refused and it started a heated verbal exchange which quickly escalated into a raging argument as the train raced through Goregaon and Malad. Then, in a horrifying burst of violence, the suspect allegedly pulled out a knife and repeatedly stabbed Lohar in the abdomen and chest as the train zoomed past Kandivali. Stunned Silence The other terrified commuters watched in stunned silence as the attack unfolded and ended within a matter of minutes claiming the young boy. Writhing in pain and bleeding profusely, Lohar collapsed onto the compartment floor as panic gripped the passengers and they scrambled away from the attacker, who reportedly continued to pace about menacingly. Eyewitnesses later said that as the train slowed while entering Borivali station’s Platform No. 6, the suspect calmly jumped off, ran up the staircase and vanished into the wet darkness. When the train halted at Borivali at 11.04 pm, the other commuters immediately alerted railway authorities. WR, GRP and medical personnel rushed to the platform within minutes with emergency equipment, medicos, porters and a stretcher. Lohar was first rushed to the station’s Emergency Medical Room, where a doctor examined him and declared him dead. His body was later shifted to Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Shatabdi Hospital in Kandivali for post-mortem and other legal formalities. Special Teams The brutal killing sent shockwaves across Mumbai’s suburban rail network. In the morning, Borivali GRP Senior Police Inspector Datta Khuperkar said seven special teams were formed and nearly 400 CCTV camera feeds were scrutinised to trace the suspect. The attacker was captured on multiple surveillance cameras, cool and casual, without a hint of remorse, walking out of Borivali station after the attack. Following an intensive 14-hour manhunt, he was tracked down and arrested at Panvel in Raigad. The Borivali GRP has registered a murder case and launched a detailed investigation. As news of the shocking crime spread amid Wednesday’s torrential rains, commuters expressed outrage and disbelief that a trivial dispute over closing a train door could culminate in such a savage killing. Pall of gloom in Virar Early Wednesday morning, the Lohar family of Virar was devastated on learning about the horrifying killing of their favourite child, Mayank in a train altercation. His parents, three brothers and a sister could barely speak, with his wailing mother demanding “he must be hanged”. Consoling each other, one sister lamented how he was a quiet boy, rarely stepped out of the house without any reason and had his entire life before him that was snuffed out. Venting their ire, they asked “where was the police, why the other commuters didn’t help him” and warned that today it was their son, “next it can be anybody’s son”. The massive dragnet Barely hours after the brutal killing of Mayank Lohar, the Borivali GRP launched one of the biggest manhunts to track and apprehend the suspected killer from Panvel in Raigad district. He was later identified as one Roshan Suvarna, 30, of Mira Road, running a barcode business, informed Borivali GRP Senior Police Inspector Datta Khuperkar. “We formed seven teams with around 10 police personnel supervised by 15 officers. They scanned footage from over 400 CCTVs to trace the regular movements of the accused. The GRP stations of Borivali, Andheri, Mira Road and Nalasopara were involved in the search. We deployed tech-intel to scour his mobile and with help of our network of informers, finally caught him in Panvel,” a weary but victorious Khuperkar told ‘The Perfect Voice’. He added that after completing the legal and medical formalities, he will be produced before a Borivali Court for remand.

When Unofficial Influence Silently Bends The Company

Teams don’t follow the org chart. They follow influence.

It began, as distortions often do, with something small. A client asked for a minor tweak. Priya created a plan, aligned the team, and got ready to ship. Twelve minutes later, the direction changed completely. Not because the client updated the brief. Not because Rohit, the founder, intervened. It changed because someone Rohit trusted… a former colleague, not part of the company … dropped a casual suggestion on WhatsApp: “Try a different structure. Might work better.”


A side comment. An informal opinion. And suddenly the team’s work reshuffled.


That’s system distortion:  the moment unofficial influence quietly overrides official structure. The team didn’t complain.


But they did wonder: “Who are we actually taking direction from?” A healthy system bends under strategy. A distorted one bends under proximity.


Every company has an invisible org chart. Titles say one thing. Behaviour says another.


Most teams slowly learn to navigate two structures: The formal org chart and he real influence map. Influence comes from: tenure (“He’s been here forever”), trust (“She knows the founder best”), competence (“He fixes everything”), charisma (“Everyone listens to her”), or external voices (“Mentor said this yesterday…”).


None of these appear in job descriptions. All of them shape decisions.

System distortion is rarely malicious. It is simply unacknowledged power.

 

Three Unofficial Power Nodes

By mid-year, The Workshop operated around three “shadow roles”:


1. The Veteran

Aman had legacy knowledge. People treated his opinion as policy because “he knows how Rohit thinks.”


2. The Interpreter

Meera translated Rohit’s intent better than anyone. Decisions were checked with her “just to be safe.”


3. The External Brain

A consultant Rohit admired occasionally dropped ideas that instantly reshaped priorities … without context or accountability.


None of them misused influence. But influence doesn’t need intention to create impact.

The system didn’t collapse. It simply drifted … subtly, daily, silently.

 

Pattern 1: The Loyalty Weight

Long-time loyalists often hold invisible authority. Not because they’re strongest. Because they’re familiar. Teams adjust around them: “Better check with him first.”, “She knows what Rohit prefers.”, “He’ll influence the decision anyway.”


Loyalty becomes gravity. Gravity shapes behaviour. Newer voices fade… not from lack of talent, but from lack of perceived permission.

 

Pattern 2: The Competence Exception

Sometimes distortion forms around the most capable person. The hyper-performer. The one who delivers under pressure. The one the boss instinctively relies on.


Soon: Nothing moves without their input, managers feel bypassed, systems bend to accommodate one person’s style. On the surface it looks efficient. Underneath, the company becomes brittle. Remove the star, and the organisation shakes.


Pattern 3: The Override Proxy

This is the most subtle distortion of all. The boss doesn’t override decisions. Someone else does it for them: “Trust me, he won’t like this.”, “Let’s realign… this is more his vibe.”, “He’ll want something sharper.” These proxies don’t hold authority. They simply channel it.


But the effect is the same: Managers lose influence, teams stop owning decisions, people optimise for the proxy instead of the structure.


Pattern 4: The External Influence Trap

Even well-meaning external voices can destabilise internal work: A mentor suggests a tweak, an investor questions a KPI, a consultant criticises a slide, a friend shares a “thought” And suddenly six weeks of work feels “misaligned.”


The team begins working against ghosts… unseen opinions that override internal clarity. External insight is valuable. But without boundaries, it becomes internal disturbance.


Why System Distortion Is So Dangerous

Its symptoms are subtle: Decisions feel inconsistent, ownership becomes uneven, managers lose authority, teams second-guess the “real” source of direction, work slows not from laziness, but from navigational anxiety. Systems break quietly long before they break visibly.


Bosses believe they’ve built a clear structure. Teams experience an informal constellation. Bosses think decisions flow through roles. Teams know they flow through influence.

Bosses assume clarity. Teams behave inside ambiguity. A system doesn’t fail because it’s weak. It fails because it’s unclear.


The People Paradox showed how teams drift from leaders. The Boss Paradox shows how leaders distort systems without meaning to. Five hidden fractures. Five mirrors. Not to blame… but to see. Because companies rarely break from incompetence. 


They break from invisibility. Clarity is the beginning. Rebuilding is what comes next.


(The writer is Co-founder at PPS Consulting. She writes about the human mechanics of scaling where workplace behavior quietly shapes business outcomes.)


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