Odisha train accident: Congress president Kharge writes to PM Modi, says CBI meant to investigate crimes, not railway accidents

He said it was unfortunate that “the people in charge – your goodself and Railway Minister Ashwani Vaishnav – do not want to admit that there are problems”.

“The Railway Minister claims to have already found a root cause, but yet has requested the CBI to investigate,” Kharge said.

Kharge argued that in 2016 the then railways minister had asked the National Investigation Agency to investigate the derailment of a train in Kanpur in which 150 people were killed.

“Subsequently, you yourself claimed in an election rally in 2017 that there was a “conspiracy”. The nation was assured that the strictest punishment would be meted out. However, in 2018, the NIA closed the investigation and refused to file a chargesheet. The nation is still in the dark – who is responsible for 150 avoidable deaths?” Kharge asked.

“The statements so far and the roping in of yet another agency without the required expertise remind us of 2016. They show that your government has no intent to address the systemic safety malaise, but is instead finding diversionary tactics to derail any attempts to fix accountability,” he said.

Kharge said the train accident in Odisha was an eye-opener for all. “All the empty safety claims of the Railway Minister have now been exposed. There is serious concern among the common passengers about this deterioration in safety. Therefore, it is incumbent upon the government to ascertain and bring to light the real reasons that caused this grave accident. Today, the most crucial step is to prioritise installation of mandatory safety standards and equipment across railway routes to ensure safety of our passengers and no recurrence of an accident like the one at Balasore,” he said.

Kharge added, “Instead of focusing on strengthening the railways at the basic level, only superficial touch-up is being done to stay in news.”

“Instead of making the railways more effective, more advanced, and more efficient, it is instead being meted out with step-motherly treatment. Meanwhile, consistently flawed decision-making has made travelling by rail unsafe and has in turn compounded the problems of our people,” he said.

In his letter, Kharge posed 11 questions to Prime Minister Modi. He pointed out that about 3 lakh posts are lying vacant in Indian Railways.

“In fact, in the East Coast Railway – the site of this tragic accident – about 8,278 posts are vacant. It’s the same story of apathy and negligence even in the case of senior positions, where both the PMO and the Cabinet Committee play a crucial role in appointments. There were more than 18 lakh railway employees in the decade of the nineties, which have now been reduced to about 12 lakh, of which, 3.18 lakh are employed on contractual basis. Vacant posts pose a threat to the assured jobs of people who belong to SC / ST / OBC and EWS. It’s a pertinent question to ask – why have such high number of vacancies not been filled over the last 9 years?” he asked.

He said the Railway Board itself had admitted that loco pilots have had to work longer hours than mandated due to workforce shortage.

“Loco pilots are crucial to safety and their overburden is proving to be the main cause of accidents. Why have their positions not been filled yet?” he asked.

Kharge also referred to a letter written by the Principal Chief Operations Manager of Karnataka-based South Western Railway to his signalling counterpart in February highlighting an issue of “signal failure” with the Sampark Kranti Express. “Why and how could the Ministry of Railways ignore this crucial warning?” he asked.

Kharge pointed out that the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture had “criticised the complete apathy and negligence of the Railway Board towards recommendations of the Commission of Railway Safety (CRS) pulled up the Railway Board for not following safety procedures”.

With the latest audit report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) stating that nearly three in four “consequential train accidents” across the country between 2017-18 and 2020-21 were caused by derailments, Kharge asked, “…why were these grave red flags ignored?”

“Why was the previous government’s plans to roll out the anti-train-collision system, originally named Raksha Kavach, put on the back burner? Your government simply renamed the scheme ‘Kavach’ and in March 2022, the Railway Minister himself projected the rechristened scheme as a new novel invention. But the question still remains, why have only a measly 4 per cent of routes of Indian Railways been protected by ‘Kavach’ till now?” he asked.

Kharge also asked the prime minister the reason for merging the Budget for Indian Railways with the Union Budget in 2017-18, wondering, “has this not adversely affected the autonomy and decision-making capacity of Indian Railways?”

“Was this done to undermine the autonomy of Railways to push reckless privatisation?” he asked.