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Hartosh Singh Bal
KHANNA, Nov 27: In a massive rescue and relief operation, 190 bodies were extricated up to 8 pm today from the wreckage of the Frontier Mail and the Sealdah Express which were involved in a crash between Kauri and Daudpur villages near Khanna in Ludhiana District yesterday. Recovery of ten to 15 more bodies is likely from the last of the mangled bogies. Out of the 125 identified, 117 bodies have been handed over to the relatives.
The remaining unidentified bodies are being emblamed and shifted to the mortuary at the Anatomy Department of the Rajendra Medical College in Patiala. These will be kept in the hospital which has refrigeration facilities. Enquiries can be made at the hospital telephone numbers 0175-212018, 0175-304634. Information regarding the bodies and the injured admitted at various hospitals is also available at website www.nic.in/ Punjab.
Meanwhile, the Ludhiana-Ambala-Delhi rail track has been cleared of the wreckage and is likely to be restored by tonight. Throught the night, and lateinto this evening, rescue and relief effort continued at the site. Even as cranes were moving the wreckage to one side to clear the tracks, the body of one of the first to die in the accident and among the last to be extricated was clearly visible, crushed between the engine of the Sealdah Express which had sliced clean through the first derailed bogie of the Frontier Mail.
Most of the dead in the last coach were military personnel. Their bodies were so badly mutilated that their identity cards were the only means of identification. Bodies of ten military personnel have been identified and the number is expected to go up.
Last night, 23 bodies had been retrieved from the wreckage. The stretchers were manned by the Railway Scouts contingent from Ambala, some of them were railway employees, others their children still in high school and college, who have been working without a break since 9 a.m. yesterday.
``The only moments of satisfaction were when we managed to save a life. There was a lady whom wecould hear screaming but couldn't get to. Finally we had to cut through the metal from below and we managed to rescue her alive,'' said Daljit Singh, 21, a clerk in the railways.
They were not the only volunteers pitching in. Red Cross ambulances ferried the dead to A.S. College, Khanna, where NCC cadets and volunteers stood on duty throughout helping the relatives identify bodies and claim compensation.
Farmers from the nearby villages were again present, serving food and water to those involved in the rescue effort and the many who were there looking for some news of their relatives aboard the trains.
Raj Kumar Bhatia and Ashok Singh reached the site all the way from Meerut at 5 in the evening. Throughout the night they kept vigil hoping to get some news of their cousin Ravikant Wadhwan. Unhappy with the railways, they said, ``When we reached Ambala, we asked for a list of the dead. It was illegible and the official there told us to try and read it on our own because he couldn't. When we got here wefound that railway officials seem to be more interested in clearing the tracks and resuming traffic rather then extricating those trapped. There have been some miracles, there would have been a lot more if the work was done properly,.'' they added.
Railway officials, not wanting to be identified, said one of the reasons for such an impression was that the only cranes available for the job were based on the tracks.``It was necessary to clear the wreckage on either side before proceeding to the tangled mass of metal at the centre. The railways do not possess a large enough road-based crane which is needed to rescue the survivors quickly. Many more lives could have been saved, ''they added.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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