Negligence of people on tracks led to Amritsar tragedy, says CCRS report; clean chit for Rlys

New Delhi: "Negligence" of people led to last month's Amritsar tragedy in which 60 people were mowed down by a train as they watched Dussehra celebrations while standing on a railway track, the Chief Commissioner of Railway Safety said in his provisional report on Thursday, virtually giving the railways a clean chit in the case.

"Having carefully considered the factual material and circumstantial evidences so far available at my disposal, I have provisionally come to the conclusion that the unfortunate incident of running over of 60 persons near Jaura-Fatak near Amritsar railway station of Ferozpur division of Northern Railways on October 19, 2018 at 6:55 pm occurred due to the negligence of persons reportedly standing on and near railway track witnessing Dussehra Mela at Dhobi Ghat," CCCRS S K Pathak said in the report, a copy of which is with PTI.

He has further classified the accident as "error in working by public near railway line" and made a slew of recommendations to avoid such accidents in the future.

The Commission of Railway Safety, works under the administrative control of the Ministry of Civil Aviation and deals with matters pertaining to safety of rail travel and train operation and is tasked with certain statutory functions to investigate railway accidents.

During its enquiry, Pathak noticed that the spot of the incident was not visible till the train was within 20 metres of the revellers due to the S-curve.

The incident took place at a time when there was smoke in the air due to fire crackers and burning of Ravana's effigy, the report said. It also stated that while the permissible speed on this section was 100 kmph, the train was running at a speed of 82 kmph when the loco pilot saw the crowd and applied brakes. In the trial, it was seen that the braking distance of the train was 389 metres.