Rail queen 'Didi' continues on disaster track

KOLKATA: The comatose state of the Indian Railways under the stewardship of Mamata Banerjee was highlighted yet again on Monday when 60 people were killed and over 90 injured when a train travelling at high speed tore through a stationary one at the Sainthia station in Birbhum district of West Bengal.

The accident, the seventh under Ms Banerjee’s second innings at the helm in Rail Bhawan, exposed her to charges of being cavalier in her treatment of affairs pertaining to her ministry. The railways carry about 15 million people each day on 11,000 passenger trains, and 1.4 million tonnes of freight.

Ms Banerjee remains an absentee minister focussing her energies on her single-minded objective of occupying Writers’ Building in Kolkata and Rail Bhawan has been running on auto pilot. As bodybags pile up in the wake of a sudden spurt in train accidents, there is growing unease in the government over the price it’s being forced to pay on account of the decision-making paralysis.

Crucial decisions relating to the modernisation, safety and security, ministry sources point out, have been left in limbo with Ms Banerjee opting to spend all her time plotting the downfall of the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government.

Important files on the tendering process to procure track, wagons, cement and iron rods have, it is learnt, been lying unattended.