Collision course

Patna, Sept. 10: The inquiry committee set up to probe the accident at a manned railway station near Semra station in East Champaran district on August 18 has held gateman Santosh Kumar responsible.

The tragedy had claimed 19 lives.

The railways had constituted a four-member committee headed by Kaushik Mukhopadhaya, the chief safety officer of East Central Railway (ECR). Chief signalling engineer (north) Ram Bechan, chief engineer (track maintenance), V.K. Sahu and chief transport planning manager Salil Kumar Jha assisted Mukhopadhaya.

One of the members of the probe committee told The Telegraph on Wednesday: “The probe into the train accident has been completed and the committee has given its observation in the report. It has been clearly mentioned in the report that the accident occurred owing to negligence of gateman Santosh Kumar (23). His job was to ensure that the gates at the level crossing were closed but he did not do that.”

When the Dehradun-bound Rapti Ganga Express rammed into a packed autorickshaw near Chhapra Bahas village, Santosh fled the accident site but after two days he was arrested from Madhubani district while trying to sneak into Nepal.

The inquiry team would submit its report to ECR general manager Madhuresh Kumar in the next two days after which it would be sent to the commission of railway safety.

Mukhopadhyaya is in Latehar at the moment, where Maoists had blown up a rail track. He would submit the report to the ECR general manager.

Sharing more on the report, the probe committee member said: “Every member of the committee has given their own observation. The technical aspect has been mentioned in the report and a few systemic failures have also been found. One person is not responsible for the train accident. However, the main culprit in this case is the gateman. The role of the assistant station master of Semra, Sunil Kumar, has also been found to be questionable.”

At present, Santosh is in jail and has been put under suspension.

Apart from a dozen eyewitnesses, the investigating team also quizzed Santosh, Sunil and B.M. Tripathi, the traffic inspector of Bapudham Motihari railway station.

On whether the assistant stationmaster and the gateman had exchanged the private number, which was the most important angle of the investigation, the official said: “That is classified information which I cannot share at this stage. The committee investigating on the behalf of the commission of railway safety comes under the administrative control of the ministry of civil aviation and not the railway ministry. However, this important angle has been discussed and mentioned in detail.”

The exchange of the private number system is adopted to ensure closure of gates at manned level crossings.

Under the rules, the stationmaster of the nearest railway station passes on information to the gateman with the train number and direction. The gateman on duty repeats the particulars of the train and then closes the gates. The gateman then communicates a random number to the stationmaster, who in turn, also mentions a number to him.

The exchange of numbers is to make sure that it is indeed the stationmaster and gateman who are communicating.

The official added: “The reason behind not sharing the classified information is that the commission of railway safety has a right to make changes in the inquiry if it is not satisfied with the investigation. The commission frames charges against the people responsible and accordingly take action.”