Rail mishaps pile up on watch of Ashwini Vaishnaw
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Darjeeling rail accident raises question on safety achievement
By Manish Anand
New Delhi, June 17: Union Minister for Railways Ashwini Vaishnaw took more than two hours to post a message on the Darjeeling rail mishap on Monday. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had already shared details of the state government’s relief and rescue efforts for the victims of the rail mishap.
On the watch of Vaishnaw, the Ministry of Railways is battling an uptick in the rail accidents. The Balasore triple train mishap in June last year was one of the biggest for several years.
The staffers at the Rail Bhavan sought to hard sell that Vaishnaw had already been manning the War Room in the building after the rail mishap. The Railway Board Jaya Verma Sinha looked stressed while sharing details of the mishap.
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Former Railways Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav asked, who is responsible for the rail accidents. Vaishnaw is evidently in a spot, for there appears no lessons learnt within the Railways over the mishaps.
The Ministry of Railways had blamed the loco pilot in the triple train collision in the Balasore accident in which 296 passengers had died. The Railways had blamed the loco pilot overshooting the signal in the Balasore accident.
The Railways unofficially circulated on Monday that overshooting the signal was again responsible for the Darjeeling rail mishap. The Kolkata-bound Kanchanjunga-Sealdah Express was hit from behind by a goods train.
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Nine passengers reportedly have died in the mishap. The loss of life was minimised because of the two parcel vans and guard coach being at the rear side of the ill-fated train.
There had been seven major rail mishaps in 2023. A train mishap in October, 2023 in Andhra Pradesh had left 14 passengers dead. This rail mishap was also allegedly caused with the loco pilot overshooting the signal.
In October last year, another rail mishap took place involving North East after six coaches derailed near Buxar. Four passengers lost their lives in the mishap.
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Nine passengers lost their lives after a fire broke out in the Lucknow-Rameshwaram Bharat Gaurav train.
After the Covid-19 pandemic during which rail operations were curtailed, there is an uptick in the rail accidents. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in a report submitted in parliament had said that 69 per cent of rail mishaps were caused by derailment during 2017-21.
The Congress president Mallikarjuna Kharge in a letter in the wake of the Balasore mishap had said that not more than 10 per cent of the rail mishaps were being probed by the Commissioner of Rail Safety (CRS).
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