Track changes: Accidents on rise as Railways grapples mounting pressure

In recent years, the railways has been able to curtail consequential accidents, defined as the ones that cause loss of life, several injuries, and loss of rail property and stoppage of rail traffic

It was the evening of June 2, a Friday. At the Bahanaga Bazar railway station in Odisha, two of its four tracks were occupied by stationary goods trains. At five minutes to six, the Coromandel Express, on its way from Shalimar in West Bengal to Chennai in Tamil Nadu, came rattling along. Travelling at 128 km an hour, it veered off track and crashed into the back of one of the two goods trains.

Since the goods train was loaded with iron ore, the Coromandel Express ended up bearing most of the impact. Twenty-one of its coaches swung away and hit