A fatal train collision took place last October, during the one-day (ODI) cricket world cup in India. The Minister of Railways Ashwini Vaishnaw, said “The recent case in Andhra Pradesh happened because both the loco-pilot and co-pilot were distracted by the cricket match.”
The drivers of the train missed a signal, which caused them to plough into another train in front of them, killing 14 people. The drivers were distracted because they were watching a cricket match on a phone, claimed India’s railway minister this past Monday.
In response to this catastrophic event, he has claimed that they are “installing systems which can detect any such distraction and make sure the pilots and assistant pilots are fully focused on running the train”.
After this incident, the men were removed from their post of train drivers for negligence, after 50 carriages barrelled for close to two hours.
India has one of the world’s largest rail networks and has seen multiple disasters over the years, with the most deadly killing an estimated 800 people in 1981. More recently, in June 2023, a three-train collision killed nearly 300 people in the state of Odisha.
In response to these events, India has been investing huge sums of money to upgrade their railway network with modern technology.
Edited by: Megha Siddapura Manjunatha
