Odisha Train Accident: Varun Gandhi Urges MPs To Donate Part Of Salary To Help Families Of Victims

New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Varun Gandhi on Saturday urged fellow parliamentarians to donate a part of their salary to help the families of victims of the 'heart-rending' Odisha train accident. Taking to his official Twitter account, he said the families should first get support and then justice. The Lok Sabha MP from Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh also said that people will have to stand with the grief-stricken families like a rock.

"It is my request to all fellow parliamentarians that we all come forward and donate a part of our salary to help these grief-stricken families to help them," Varun Gandhi said in a tweet in Hindi.

उड़ीसा की रेल दुर्घटना हृदय विदारक है!

जो परिवार इस हादसे से टूटे हैं हमें उनके साथ चट्टान की तरह खड़ा होना होगा।

मेरा सभी साथी सांसदों से निवेदन है कि हम सभी अपनी तनख्वाह का एक हिस्सा शोक संतप्त परिजनों के नाम कर उनकी मदद के लिए आगे आयें।

पहले उन्हें सहारा मिले, फिर न्याय।

— Varun Gandhi (@varungandhi80) June 3, 2023

Odisha train accident: Death toll mounts to 288 

The three-train crash in Odisha's Balasore district has so far left 288 people dead and over 1,100 injured. The crash involving Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express and Shalimar-Chennai Central Coromandel Express, which were carrying around 2,500 passengers, and a goods train occurred around 7 PM on Friday near the Bahanaga Bazar station in Balasore, about 250 km south of Kolkata and 170 km north of Bhubaneswar.

Twenty-one coaches were derailed and severely damaged in the accident, trapping hundreds of passengers. Both passenger trains were at a high speed and it has been cited by experts as one of the main reasons for the high number of casualties.

The rescue operation was wrapped up Saturday afternoon and restoration work started. With traffic on the route disrupted, over 150 trains were cancelled, diverted or short-terminated.

Preliminary investigations have revealed that a signal was given to Coromandel Express to enter the main line but it was taken off and the train entered the loop line and crashed into a goods train parked there.

The Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express which was coming at high speed rammed into the coaches of Coromandel Express that had scattered on the adjacent track.

While questions were raised on why the anti-train collision system 'Kavach' did not work, the railways said it was not available on the route.