KOLKATA: Barely 48 hours after the Balasore tragedy, an intense political slugfest between the West Bengal’s ruling party Trinamool Congress and the BJP broke out on Sunday as chief minister Mamata Banerjee slammed the Centre alleging the government should conduct an investigation to find out the reason behind the mishap instead of spreading false information to malign her image.
Seventeen coaches were derailed and severely damaged in the triple train crash in Odisha's Balasore district on Friday night, killing at least 275 people and injuring over 1,100 so far.
Without dropping Prime Minister Narendra Modi's name, Mamata said he is busy glorifying his name by constructing the new Parliament building and stadium.
Mamata’s attack on the Centre came shortly after railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, on Sunday, refuted her theory that the mishap could have been averted had the anti-collision device been in place. Banerjee mentioned that the device had been introduced during her second stint as the Union Railway Minister between 2009 and 2011.
"Kavach or what Mamata Banerjee told yesterday has no link with the mishap. Preliminary investigation suggests it was because of an electronic interlocking system. The exact reason can be ascertained after the completion of the investigation," said Vaishnaw.
Asked about it, Mamata said, "When I mentioned about the anti-collision device yesterday standing beside the railway minister, why didn’t he open his mouth? Instead, his body language gave a nod to my claim. Other BJP leaders were present there but none of them objected to my logic. Now the railways are coming up with two versions — interlocking and signalling issues. There must be something wrong that needs to be investigated."
Though the Bengal CM repeatedly said it was not the time for doing politics over the issue of the Balasore mishap, she made it clear that she is being forced to issue such statements to counter BJP’s attack circulating false information.
Terming the Balasore mishap as the biggest tragedy triggered by negligence, Bengal CM, without dropping the Prime Minister’s name, said, "you should have apologised after the accident. But you are busy glorifying your name by constructing the new Parliament building and stadium in your name Instead of conducting a probe into the mishap, you are playing a dirty nuisance game to malign a former railway minister."
"I received a message mentioning the number of deaths in accidents during the tenure of me and Nitish Kumar as railway minister. The message says more than 3,000 persons died during my stint as railway minister which is a blatant lie," she said.
Mamata gave a list of train accidents with death toll break up which showed 309 persons died in five rail accidents during her stint as the railway minister from 1999 to 2000 and 2009 to 2011.
"Such false information is being circulated deliberately. The government of India is doing what they want to do. They can change any number. I want to know how many died in the Godhra train massacre? I want to know who set the running train on fire in Godhra?" Mamata fumed.
She said that 62 victims have so far been identified from West Bengal and 206 persons are admitted to hospitals in the state. Announcing Rs 5 lakh compensation for each victim's family, Mamata said, "182 deceased are yet to be identified and the death toll from Bengal will rise once the bodies will be identified."
Meanwhile, BJP MLA and West Bengal's Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari visited the accident spot on Sunday and hit out at Mamata and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee, who had demanded the resignation of Ashwini Vaishnaw on Saturday.
"Bengal fails to provide basic healthcare facilities and this is why so many people travel in trains like Coromandel Express for better treatment in Odisha and other states in south India. This the same reason this was why Abhishek Banerjee flew to the US for treatment of his eye while our President of India went to the Army’s hospital for the same treatment. How did Mamata come to know that an anti-collision device was not present on the train?" asked Adhikari.