Modi has spent billions modernising India’s trains but safety is biggest need
Though the number of railway accidents has come down in the past few years, derailment remains the main cause...
Odisha train crash: Why do trains in India go off tracks?
Only a comprehensive inquiry will help uncover the truth behind the incident. Yet it has once again ignited fresh concerns regarding railway safety in India... derailment continues to be a "bugbear for the railways," a former Railway Board chairman, Vivek Sahai, told me. A train can derail for a number of reasons - "a track could be ill-maintained, a coach could be faulty, and there could be an error in driving". A government railway safety report for 2019-20 found derailments were responsible for 70% of the railway accidents, up from 68% the previous year. (Train fires and collisions came next, responsible for 14% and 8% of the total accidents respectively). The report counted 40 derailments involving 33 passenger trains and seven freight trains during the year under review. Of these 17 derailments were caused by track "defects" - this could include fractures and subsidence of tracks. Only nine incidents of derailments were caused because of defects in trains - engines, coaches, wagons - according to the report...
India train accident: Modi vows punishments over deadly Odisha crash
People found guilty over a deadly rail accident in eastern India will be "punished stringently", the country's Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said... It is still not clear what caused the multi-train collision in Balasore district, which has been described as India's worst rail accident this century. A full investigation has been launched, but a preliminary report indicates that the accident was the result of signal failure, said KS Anand, chief public relations officer of the South Eastern Railway... "The Coromandel Express was supposed to travel on the main line, but a signal was given for the loop line instead, and the train rammed into a goods train already parked over there," Mr Anand said. "Its coaches then fell on to the tracks on either side, also derailing the Howrah Superfast Express"...