The death toll from a deadly train accident in Balochistan’s Bolan has risen to 19 and around a dozen people are still in critical condition, officials said on Wednesday. The Jaffar Express, carrying around 300 passengers from the provincial capital Quetta to Rawalpindi, derailed on Tuesday, though the cause remains unknown. Officials said that three more people succumbed to their injuries overnight. The death toll has risen to 19 now. A total of 96 people are being treated in hospitals and around a dozen are still critical,” Akbar Hussain Durrani, home secretary of Balochistan, told AFP. Balochistan Chief Minister Dr Abdul Malik Baloch, who also reached the site of the disaster, has asked the minister of railways to carry out a full inquiry into the causes of the accident. So far, we have only conjecture. Local officials say there was brake failure and the driver failed to pull into a side rail as is the prescribed practice in such circumstances. There are also accounts stating the driver was over-speeding. Passengers who survived say the train was hurtling down the tracks with its whistle blowing constantly at the time of the crash when the bogies overturned sending passengers flying out of their seats. With the driver among those killed, only a full investigation can determine precisely what happened and how such a tragedy can be avoided in the future. The railways minister has been constantly heard making popular noises about turning around the organisation. While some experts have found reason to praise Minister Saad Rafique, those with greater expertise in the field often caution against the much-celebrated surface changes that hide the ugly reality: that the railways’ infrastructure is in a shambles. The truth is that whatever ‘improvements’ are carried out within the system in the name of safety, speed and reliability, are limited to the more visible and more privileged sections — for instance, the two favourite routes, the Lahore-Karachi and Lahore-Rawalpindi sections. Areas such as Aab-i-Gum in Bolan stand by and are lost to officials until they abruptly become the news as in Tuesday’s accident when a driver tried to apply the brakes on a long slide. If this is human error the blame must rest at the top of the fragile system. Pakistan’s record, as far as rail safety goes, is not comforting. An extensive network of rail tracks, largely a legacy of colonial times, snakes its way across the country reaching even the most remote of areas. But we have failed to maintain this system well. The tracks are in disrepair in many places, railway engines have been allowed to break down and accidents are not uncommon. In July this year, 18 people died when a bridge in Gujranwala collapsed as a train passed over it. Millions of Pakistanis who rely on trains as a means of transport regularly put their lives at risk. The railway ministry needs to take urgent steps to ensure that railway journeys become safer and passengers do not fall victim to avoidable negligence.
pk.shafaqna.com
