New Delhi, 7/7: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has on Friday arrested three people in connection with the Balasore train accident in Odisha that left at least 290 people dead and injured more than 1,000 people during the triple train crash.
The accident took place when a passenger train hit a stationary freight train, jumped off the tracks and hit another passenger train coming from the opposite direction.
CBI arrested senior Section engineer Arun Kumar Mohanta, section engineer Mohammad Amir Khan and technician Pappu Kumar under Sections 304 and 201 of CrPC, the penal code sections related to culpable homicide.
A high-level inquiry has found ”wrong signalling” to be the main reason for the Balasore train accident and flagged ”lapses at multiple levels” in the signalling and telecommunication (S&T) department, but indicated the tragedy could have been averted if past red flags were reported.
The independent inquiry report submitted by the Commission of Railway Safety (CRS) to the Railway Board said notwithstanding the lapses in signalling work, remedial actions could have been taken by the S&T staff if ”repeated unusual behaviour” of switches connecting two parallel tracks were reported to them by the station manager of Bahanaga Bazar, the spot of the acciden
