Burning Train: Railways suspect the hand of miscreants in fire incident, ADRM to arrive at Silchar
আগুন লাগিয়েছে কোনও দুষ্কৃতী, রেল বিভাগের অনুমান

July 9: The incident of fire which completely gutted three coaches of Silchar-Thiruvananthapuram Express at Silchar Railway Station has sent a chill of horror. Though there was no casualty yet the railways have taken this matter quite seriously and are on for a serious investigation. The railway authorities immediately unhooked the three bogies from this train which saved the other compartments from getting burnt.

Highly placed sources in the railways revealed that the train arrived at Silchar Railway Station from Thiruvananthapuram at 11 PM on Saturday. Within an hour, that is, by 12 midnight, the entire train was checked and doors of all the bogies were locked. It is just after around 7 hours that fire broke out inside one of the compartments. The question that crops up is that how did such a massive fire broke out inside a train whose all compartments were locked?

At the outbreak of fire, it was assumed that fire started from the pantry car at around 7:30 in the morning on Sunday. But gradually it was found that fire first broke out from a sleeper coach.and slowly moved on to one Chair Car coach and the pantry car. GRP has been assigned the task of investigation into this incident. Meanwhile, on condition of anonymity, a railway official said that how can fire start inside the pantry car after 7 hours of locking all the doors of the coaches.

In another development, Additional Divisional Railway Manager (ADRM) of NF Railway is on his way from Lumding with a high level team to inquire into this matter. Nripen Bhattacharjee, Senior Public Relations Officer (PRO) of NF Railway while speaking to way2barak said, “The burning of three bogies is a very serious incident and the railways is contemplating thorough investigation into this matter.”

However, prima facie evidence reveals that the incident of fire is work of miscreant(s). The target probably was the pantry car to mislead people so that it appears that fire broke out from the pantry. It is also speculated that some miscreants might have thrown a glowing cigarette intentionally to burn the train. It is hoped that the CCTV’s installed in the station premises will provide clue to how the fire actually broke out.

Also Read: 3 compartments of Silchar-Trivandrum express gutted in fire at Silchar Railway Station