LAHORE, Oct 1: The Sept 26 derailment of the Quetta Express on the Sibi-Jacobabad section which resulted in death of eight passengers and injuries to 48 caused Pakistan Railways a loss of Rs25 million.
Speaking at a news conference on Tuesday, general manager (operations) Iqbal Samad Khan categorically denied reports that the accident occurred due to the collapse of an old bridge.
He claimed that investigators noticed that the fishplates had been tampered with about 42 feet before the bridge.
“This led to the derailment of eight bogies of the Quetta-bound train which was travelling at the speed of 80 kilometres per hour,” he said.
Mr Khan said the federal inspector of railways would hold an inquiry into the accident from Oct 6 to 8. He promised that the inquiry report would be released to the press.
The GM said Rs200,000 each would be paid to the families of eight dead people, Rs100,000 each to those who lost their limbs while Rs20,000 each to those who sustained minor injuries.
Mr Khan said there existed 13,750 bridges on the 8,000-kilometre-long rail network and it was quite difficult to man each section of the track for which the organization would need a huge manpower.
However, he said, all the bridges were being regularly inspected for any damage or fault. If a bridge needed repair, speed restriction was automatically imposed for safety purpose.
He said a majority of bridges were constructed during the pre-1947 period while 300 were built after independence on the Dera Ghazi Khan-Kashmore section. The lives of all these bridges ranges from 100 to 25 years.
He said the railways has embarked upon a seven-year track renovation plan starting with the 195-km Quetta-Rokhri section where tracks weighing 110 pounds per foot were to be laid to provide greater stability, balance and steadiness.
He claimed that the railways’ working improved due to government policies. Asked whether these policies would continue after the general election, he said it would be up to the next government to maintain or change these policies.
However, he said any deviation from these policies would retard the progress made thus far. He said the trains running on long routes were yielding more profits than those plying on short routes.
The general manager expressed his reservations over some of the editorials appearing in the press with regard to the accident and said the railway was far safe mode of journey than road transport.
He said from 1991 to 1999, 48,263 people had been killed in road accidents throughout the country while 505 people lost their lives in rail accidents from 1991 to September, 2002.
These figures, he added, were provided by the Islamabad-based National Transport Research Institute and showed that the rail journey was safer than road transport.—APP