Eight people died and over 20 passengers were injured in a massive fire that broke out in a tourist coach of a stationed train at Madurai railway station on Saturday, as per ground reports. The Southern Railways (SR) based on the preliminary investigation revealed that the passengers of the coach illegally smuggled gas cylinders which resulted in the sudden fire. The SR till now has declared four deaths and announced Rs 10 lakh ex-gratia to the families of the deceased members.
Based on the preliminary investigation, Southern Railways said, “The passengers in the private party coach/ individual coach have illegally smuggled gas cylinder and this has caused the fire. Many passengers had got out of the coach on noticing fire. Some passengers had got down at platform itself.”
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The Southern Railways officially declared that four passengers had died in the accident. The SR said that ex-gratia of Rs 10 lakhs will be paid to the family of the deceased, as per a report on ABP Nadu.
SR also appealed to rail passengers not to carry any inflammable or explosive items and travel with utmost safety by not risking their lives carrying inflammable articles.
Further, the Railways said, “Any individual can book party coach using IRCTC portal. They are not allowed to carry any inflammable material like gas cylinder. The coach is to used only for transportation purpose.”
Cause Of Madurai Train Accident
Talking to reporters after visiting the accident site, Minister P Moorthy said, "Around 55 passengers from Uttar Pradesh have taken the train for a religious yatra to Rameswaram. The accident had taken place on Saturday at around 4.30 AM."
"The passengers have made arrangements to make tea inside the compartment and locked the doors to the coach. At that time, the cylinder had suddenly burst and nine people had died in the accident," he explained.
The Minister then said that District Collector, DGP, SP and other officials were in the field and the injured were taken to Rajaji Government Hospital in Madurai
On Saturday, a fire broke out inside a stationary train compartment at Madurai railway station at 5.15 AM. The station official immediately informed the fire service who rushed to the spot and put out the fire after a 1.5-hour ordeal at 7.15 AM. No other coaches were damaged in the mishap.
The party coach started the journey from Lucknow on 17 August and was scheduled to return to Chennai on Sunday.