‘CBI probes crimes, not political failures’

An RPF personnel and locals look on, as Coromandel Express leaves Bahanaga Bazar railway station where train services resumed three days after the fatal accident, in Balasore district, Odisha, on Monday. Pic/PTI

A day after the Railways sought a CBI probe into the Odisha train tragedy, Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge on Monday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying the agency is meant to investigate crimes, not railway accidents, and cannot fix accountability for technical, institutional and political failures.

Kharge also said "all the empty safety claims" of the rail minister have been "exposed" and the government must bring to light the real reasons that caused this grave accident, which he described as one of the worst in Indian history.

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Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress president

In his letter to Modi, he said it is incumbent upon the government to ascertain and bring to light the real reasons behind the accident.

"Unfortunately, the people in charge - your goodself and Railways Minister Ashwani Vaishnaw - do not want to admit that there are problems," he said. Vaishnaw claims to have already found a root cause, but yet has requested the CBI to investigate, he said.

The 2016 accident

Kharge said the nation still remembers the 2016 derailment in Kanpur, where 150 people lost their lives and the then Railways minister asked the NIA to investigate. "Subsequently, you yourself claimed in an election rally in 2017 that there was a ‘conspiracy'. The nation was assured that strictest punishment would be meted out. However, in 2018, the NIA closed the probe and refused to file a charge sheet. The nation is still in the dark - who is responsible for 150 avoidable deaths?" Kharge, a former minister of railways, said. He said the statements so far and the roping in of yet another agency without the required expertise, remind us of 2016.

"They show that your government has no intent to address the systemic safety malaise, but is instead finding diversionary tactics to derail any attempts to fix accountability," he alleged.

The latest CAG audit report makes a special mention of how between 2017-18 and 2020-21, about seven out of 10 train accidents happened due to derailment, he said, adding, "But this was erroneously ignored. Between 2017 and 2021, there was zero testing of Rail and Weld for safety in East Coast Railways. Why were these grave red flags ignored?"

Drivers stable

The condition of injured engine driver Gunanidhi Mohanty and his assistant Hajari Behera, who are undergoing treatment at AIIMS Bhubaneswar, is stable, officials said.

"While Mohanty was taken out of the ICU on Monday, Behera is awaiting a head surgery," South Eastern Railway chief spokesperson Aditya Choudhury said.

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