Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said that the Union government had not learnt lessons from past incidents after 13 coaches of the Mysuru-Darbhanga Bagmati Express train derailed following a collision with a stationary goods train in Tamil Nadu’s Tiruvallur district.
A fire also broke out in two coaches of the express train after the collision at the Kavaraipettai railway station on Friday evening.
No deaths have been reported so far, PTI reported quoting the Railway Board. However, at least 19 persons were injured, India Today quoted unidentified officials as saying.
Following the collision, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin said that the state government was “working fast in rescue and relief work”.
Stalin added that the injured persons were taken to the hospital. “The fire department is engaged in the work of removing the accident train coaches,” he said on social media. “I am continuing to monitor the rescue operations.”
Dilip Kumar, executive director, information and publicity of the Railway Board, said that “more than 95% passengers” had been evacuated from the affected coaches. “So far, we haven’t received any information about any casualty or grievous injury,” PTI quoted Kumar as saying.
Medical and railway assistance teams were at the site to provide help to passengers, Kumar added.
On Saturday, Gandhi said that the Centre had not learnt lessons despite “many lives lost in numerous accidents”.
In a social media post, the Opposition leader said: “Accountability starts at the top. How many more families must be destroyed before this government wakes up?”
There have been several train accidents in recent months. On August 17, at least 22 coaches of the Sabarmati Express derailed near Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh. No deaths were reported.
On July 30, at least two people were killed and 20 others injured when 18 coaches of the Mumbai-Howrah Mail derailed in Jharkhand’s Seraikela-Kharsawan district.
The accident occurred when the train collided with a stationary goods train in the Chakradharpur Division of the South Eastern Railway.
On June 17, a goods train derailed in West Bengal. A day later, a passenger train collided with a goods train in Uttar Pradesh, killing a total of 12 persons.
In June 2023, 288 passengers were killed and around 900 injured when three trains collided with each other in Odisha’s Balasore, marking one of India’s worst train accidents.
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