Police use a sniffer dog to check passengers’ luggage outside Churchgate station. (Fotocorp)

Today, he is lucky to be alive. But his belongings ? his credit cards and his PAN card ? are untraceable.

Objects collected from the blast sites have been kept at the GRP offices of various stations. But most relatives of blast victims still do not know where lost belongings are kept or how they can be collected.

The senior police inspector of Andheri, S. Raskar, said: “We have carefully sealed and labelled all the items that we picked up from the blast site but it is difficult to identify owners without proper documentation. The percentage of people who have come to claim their things has been low. Given the circumstances, it is but natural.”

Officials claim that there are certain security reasons behind the measures that the GRP is taking. They say that items with blood stains on them have to be sent to the laboratories for testing. Items that look dangerous have to be seized.

“There are several mobiles that have been found at the site. We can’t just give them away. We do not know what kind of calls may have been made from them,” officers who are giving away the items under the supervision of inspector-in-charge S.H. Ahir said.

Officials conceded that not many people are coming forward to claim their baggage. “I do not have the time to go to different stations and find things as I have to visit the hospital where my cousin has been admitted every day,” Ashish, a BPO employee whose cousin suffered burns, said. Police say it isn’t easy for people to identify what is left of their dead relatives’ belongings as many identity cards have not been recovered from the rubble.

The police maintain that they have to follow certain norms. “These actions are all part of the larger probe that is going on regarding the blasts. We are not harassing anyone. If people can identify their belongings and prove that they are theirs, they can take them,” Raskar, whose station has already given away 10 items to people who have been able to prove their ownership, said.

The GRP in Andheri claimed that important documents and identity cards had been returned to people who produced documents from their employees about their presence in the trains.

But Borivli police said they would not hand over anything without a court order which, they conceded, could take a long time.

The GRP officials have made it clear that they will take good care of the items that were found at the sites. The items will remain on the station premises until the court decides otherwise.