Police are searching for a gang of about 20 Derby men after an attack on a Muslim couple on a train to Nottingham.
Abida Malik said the men called her and her husband Asif Ahmed terrorists. One man put Mr Ahmed in a headlock saying he was making a citizen’s arrest.
The gang boarded the train at Loughborough on Easter Sunday evening, after what British Transport Police believe was a drinking session.
Officers have described it as an “unpleasant and nasty” incident.
Abida Malik, who wears the hijab – or headscarf – was travelling home after a wedding in Leicester with her husband.
She said: “I was full of fear, my heart was beating really fast and I felt so helpless because there was so many of them.”
“Everyone seemed too scared to do anything… Now I don’t want to travel on the train by myself, and I don’t want him (Asif) to go by himself. They could have stabbed him”.
See also FOSIS press release, 9 April 2010