Mumbai: Two railway porters, who had gone to pick up the body of an accident victim lying on the tracks, were mowed down by an oncoming local suburban train in Vasai on Tuesday night while the station master of Vasai Road Station accompanying them was injured.
In spite of the motorman of the Virar-bound train warning the men on the tracks by honking repeatedly, the men did not hear it. “It is often difficult at night to walk near tracks and also hear the trains even though there is a standing operating procedure (SOP) to be followed when carrying out such jobs on the tracks,” Ravinder Bhakar, Chief Public Relations Officer, Western Railway, told Gulf News.
The incident occurred around 8.30pm after S Pangati Raj Naidu, 66, fell from a crowded Virar-bound train on the tracks. An announcement was made on the public address system about the accident and the two porters — Ram Vilas Paswan, 50, and Hariram Rajbhar, 40, — proceeded with a stretcher along with the station master of Vasai Road station, a railway policeman and two other porters.
The station master was injured and is being treated at a local hospital in Vasai and two porters managed to jump away from the tracks when the train came close.
Bhakar said the men are expected to wear jackets with reflectors so that they are visible. But in this case, the men were not aware of the oncoming train. It has to be seen whether they were following the procedures or not, he said. “We will be reviewing or amending these procedures after studying this case.”
He said suburban trains come at intervals of three minutes and it is not easy to stop the train nor can “we afford to disturb the traffic. We will see what should be done as every human life is precious.”
Mumbai’s rail network is the busiest in the country and it is also infamous for death on the tracks — more than 3,000 people die every year falling from trains or while crossing the tracks to reach from one side of the railway line to the other.
