BALASORE, 4 Jun: The root cause of the three-train crash in Odisha’s Balasore district and the people responsible for it have been identified, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Sunday as rescue work at the site of the accident ended with the Railways aiming to restore normal services on the affected tracks in the next few days.
As the tragedy triggered a debate over the Kavach anti-collision system, the Congress demanded the resignation of the railway minister and asked when the Modi government would implement the much-hyped system nationwide, after testing.
Vaishnaw maintained that the train crash had nothing to do with the Kavach system.
The change that was done to electronic interlocking, which led to the accident, has been identified, Vaishnaw, who has been camping at the site of the train accident along with union minister Dharmendar Pradhan, said.
He said that the issue is of electric point machine, a vital device for railway signalling, and electronic interlocking.
“The setting of the point machine was changed. How and why it was done will be revealed in the probe report,” he told PTI.
“The root cause of the horrifying incident has been identified. I do not want to go into details. Let the report come out. I will just say that the root cause and the people responsible have been identified,” the railway minister said.
An electric point machine is a vital device for railway signalling for quick operation and locking of point switches, and plays an important role in the safe running of trains. Failure of these machines severely affects train movement, and deficiencies at the time of installation can result in unsafe conditions.
The crash involving the Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express and the Shalimar-Chennai Central Coromandel Express, which were carrying around 2,500 passengers, and a goods train occurred at around 7 pm on Friday near the Bahanaga Bazaar station in Balasore. At least 288 people were dead and over 1,100 injured in the accident, the worst in India in nearly three decades.
Railway sources said that the number of deaths in the triple train crash has increased from 288 to 295, but this could not be confirmed as yet.
With hospitals around the accident site trying to deal with the enormity of the tragedy, a team of doctors and experts from the AIIMS, Delhi and other central hospitals of the national capital were rushed to Bhubaneswar on a special IAF flight.
The team is carrying medicines and heavy critical care equipment, official sources said.
Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Sunday spoke to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the phone and briefed him about the latest situation.
Noting that doctors, medical students and other healthcare service providers are doing their best, Patnaik told the prime minister that all possible steps have been taken to save the lives of injured passengers in different hospitals of Odisha.
The prime minister said that the Centre is ready to provide any kind of assistance if required, a release issued by the CMO said, quoting the prime minister.
Patnaik also announced an ex gratia of Rs 5 lakhs to the family members of the people from the state killed in the triple train accident.
Giving details of the rescue operation, Pradhan said that “the rescue work is over and we are working with the local administration to send people affected back home.”
He said also that the big challenge is to restore tracks, so that the railway link between two important wings of the country can start functioning.
“By Tuesday we should be able to do it,” the minister said.
A senior railway official at the site said, “We have teams working round-the-clock. Restoring at least two lines – up and down – is absolutely essential as quickly as possible,”
“Restoration work on tracks is on. We are also working on overhead cables and masts which were uprooted. Soon soon the down line will be restored and then the up line,” the official said.
Railway officials said that all 21 coaches which capsized due to the derailment of trains at Bahanaga Bazaar station have been grounded, and now the site is being cleared. (PTI)
