Headlines
32 killed as Varanasi-bound train derails
Rae Bareli/Lucknow, March 20 (IANS) At least 32
people were killed when the engine and three coaches of a passenger
train derailed near Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh after the driver
overshot a signal on Friday.
Northern Railway spokesman Neeraj
Sharma said in New Delhi that nearly 50 people were warded in hospitals.
Doctors in Lucknow said many of them were in critical condition. Sharma
put the death toll at 32.
The horrific accident took place at
Bachharwan railway station near Rae Bareli when the Dehradun-Varanasi
Janata Express, proceeding to Varanasi, jumped the tracks shortly after 9
a.m.
The train was to halt at Bachharwan, a small station. But
the driver didn't stop. When he realized the folly and applied the
emergency brakes, the engine and the coaches went off the tracks,
officials said.
An official statement said the train hit a sand bump, leading to the derailment.
One of the three coaches which derailed was a sleeper class. The other two were general coaches. All were packed with commuters.
As the badly injured passengers screamed in pain, the first to reach the site were people from nearby villages.
But
two of the coaches were so mangled that rescue work could not take
place until officials arrived with gas cutters to cut through the steel
to take out the dead and the still living.
When journalists too
reached the place, furious locals raised slogans against the state and
railway authorities, saying official rescuers took a long time to start
pulling out the bleeding passengers.
Some bodies were found
under the coaches, apparently thrown off the train due to the impact of
the crash. Some bodies were dismembered.
Many passengers suffered
serious injuries, primarily in the head. Others suffered concussions,
broken limbs and deep wounds. Some escaped with cuts and bruises.
One doctor said at least a dozen of those admitted to hospitals in Lucknow were battling for life.
Some
passengers were treated medically in Rae Bareli. The more serious cases
were rushed to the Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical
Sciences in Lucknow.
"The death toll could go up," an official told IANS, adding that 12 bodies remained unclaimed until late in the evening.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh, who was visiting Lucknow, met some of the injured in hospital.
President
Pranab Mukherjee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Railways Minister
Suresh Prabhu and Congress president Sonia Gandhi, in whose Lok Sabha
constituency the accident took place, mourned the loss of lives.
Northern Railway officials said that prima facie the train driver seemed to be at fault.
"The
train was to stop at the Bachharwan station but it did not. When he
realized this, the driver applied the emergency brakes, leading to the
derailment," one official said.
The railways ordered a probe into the accident.
The
railway ministry announced a compensation of Rs.2 lakh to families of
each of the dead, Rs.50,000 to the seriously injured and Rs.20,000 to
those who suffered minor injuries.
The Uttar Pradesh government announced similar compensation.
The accident disrupted train services on the important New Delhi-Lucknow-Varanasi sector.
A
special relief train was rushed from Lucknow. Officials said six
doctors and 20 ambulances were also sent to the accident site.
Buses were also despatched to the place to ferry the stranded passengers.
As
news of the accident reached Lucknow, around 100 beds were reserved in
the city's hospitals to cater to the injured, officials told IANS.
Twenty-two
people were killed when a passenger train rammed into a stationary
train in Sant Kabir Nagar district, also in Uttar Pradesh, on May 26,
2014.