Elphinstone stampede: Railways probe blames heavy rain, panic

NEW DELHI: Railways’ committee headed by chief safety officer of western railways has blamed sudden heavy rain for the stampede at a foot-over-bridge (FoB) at Elphinstone railway station in Mumbai which killed 23 people last month.
Meanwhile, the state-run transporter has set up an expert panel to probe into the 18- month delay in issuing tender for widening of a FOB at the Elphinstone Road station.
“The committee concluded that the incident occurred due to sudden downpour of heavy rains and accumulation of commuters on FOB and stair case at around 10.00 hrs onwards on that date, Railways said in a statement.
It added, “The situation aggravated further when a bundle of flowers of a vendor dropped followed by someone shouting that "Majha phool padla" and some commuters mistook the word “phool” for “pull”. This may have possibly triggered panic and led to stampede.”
As the transporter was slammed for laxity and delays in construction of new FoB at Elphinstone station after the tragedy, Railway Board decided to constitute an expert committee, headed by former Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) Pratyush Sinha, to inquire into the reasons for delay in the whole process and suggest ways and means to ensure that such delays can be minimised in future.
“The committee would inquire why it had taken 18 months after the project was cleared to issue the tender,” said an official.
The tender was incidentally floated on September 29 - the day 23 people were killed in the stampede on the existing decades-old FoB.
The panel, which also has Vinayak Chatterjee of CII and former member (engineering) railway board Subodh Jain as members, will submit its report in three months.
The 40-foot-wide overbridge was announced in the 2016 railway budget by then railway minister Suresh Prabhu and was part of the Rs 45 crore fund allocated for escalators, foot overbridges and automatic ticket vending machines for the Mumbai suburban network.
While speaking at an event in Delhi, railways minister Piyush Goyal said that he was pained that despite the new FoB being already approved, the tender was not floated in time.
“It pained me when I saw the file where a FoB in Mumbai was approved but it still took months to finalise the design and prepare the documentation to tender it. It is a wake up call for all my colleagues in the railways. They will have to bring speed and efficiency into our system,” Goyal said.