Kin of Jharkhand train fire victims distressed over hospital staff misconduct

Dhanbad, Nov 24 (ANI): Bereaved relatives of victims who died after massive fire consumed two wagons of the 'Howrah- Dehradun Express' in Jharkhand had a harassing experience at a hospital looking for the bodies of their loved ones.

The grieving father of a train fire victim told mediapersons here hospital staff took bribes before agreeing to hand over the bodies.

"The man in charge for the postmortem, standing there, has charged Rs.1000 from my nephew to show him the watch on my daughter's body for identification. He took Rs. 500 once at night and then again in the morning," said C.P. Shahi, the father of a deceased.

Shahi further lashed out at local administrative officials and hospital authorities for unnecessarily delaying the handing over of the bodies to the families.

"For six hours we could not receive the dead body of my daughter." Shahi claimed.

However, morgue staff denied allegations of misconduct.

At least seven persons died in a fire incident involving 13009 Howrah-Dehradun Doon Express between Nimiya Ghat and Parashnath stations in Giridih district under Dhanbad Railway Division of East Central Railway at about 02.35 a.m. on Tuesday.

While the train was on run, fire broke out in Three Tier Air Conditioned Coach B1, positioned eighth from train engine. Subsequently, it also spread to adjacent Three Tier AC Coach B2. As a result of the fire, the two coaches got completely burnt.

The statutory inquiry into this incident has been ordered to be conducted by the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS), Eastern Circle, under the Ministry of Civil Aviation.

General managers of all zonal railways have been instructed to exercise extra vigil and launch a special safety drive to avoid such accidents in the future. (ANI)