Outdated coaches, overcrowding led to Patna-Indore train mishap: reports
New Delhi: One of the reasons for the derailment of the Patna-Indore Express which caused the death of 120 people on Sunday is that it ran on Integrated Coach Factory (ICF) coaches, instead of the more modern Linke Hoffman Busch (LHB) coaches that make up premium trains such as the Rajdhani and Shatabdi.
According to a report in The Indian Express, this was despite Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu promise in the 2015-16 Budget that all trains would eventually have LHB coaches.
For over a year now, the Railway Board has been stalling the proposal, said the report. The Board’s argument is that the industry would not be able to match the scale of production of the new coaches. Hence, more ICF coaches than LHB coaches are still being produced each year. Currently, around 55,000 ICF coaches of varying ages are in circulation while the number of LHB coaches is just about 5,000-8,000.
Prabhu had issued an order, soon after the 2015-16 Budget, to formalise the policy for a total conversion into LHB, but the Railways bureaucracy has stalled it.
One of the shortcomings of the ICF coaches is that the design is not meant for speeds above 80-90 kmph, unlike the LHB coaches, which are designed for speeds upwards of 120 kmph. The LHB coaches also do not pile up in case of accidents unlike their ICF counterparts.
But intense lobbying by the industry involved in producing ICF coaches is helping them thrive in the market, said the report.
Another report suggested that the number of passengers aboard the Patna-Indore Express on Sunday were much higher than permitted. While the Railways claimed that around 1200 people were on board, hundreds of passengers were traveling either without ticket or with general ticket. The report suggested that this number might have been as high as 500, which is almost half the capacity of the train.
There were long queues of people waiting to board the train in the general bogie – a much larger number than the coaches could accommodate. There were several people who were traveling with a Waiting List ticket, as well as those who were simply ticketless, said the report.
