I guess this is exactly the attitude of the government and all government organizations including the railways and the Railway police. Samjhauta Express traveling from New Delhi to Pakistan had two bomb blasts near Panipat.

The reports in the Newspaper said that an anonymous letter was sent to the Old Delhi Railway Station that bombs would be planted on trains leaving that station but that warning was ignored. This is not the first time a bomb went of in a train. Last year seven of them went of one after another in local trains of Bombay and in spite of that nothing concrete seems to have been done to prevent such accidents.

The Railway minister Lalu Prasad Yadav admitted that there has been negligence on the part of railway. The authorities are saying that it is not possible for them to check the baggage of every person travelling by trains and to a certain extent they are right too. They tried to frisk every person traveling by local trains in Bombay but failed as they watched the lines swell.

No doubt that there are too many people traveling but is this a valid excuse to endanger the lives of so many people. The Lockerbie, Scotland crash of a PANAM forced its closer and lawsuits worth $300 million were filed against it. On one end you have this and on the other end you have a railway that is saying that it won't do anything to ensure safety of people because it doesn't have the infrastructure and facilities for it.

Although I am quite appalled by what has happed and even while these people have my support, I cant help but smile when I read the sign they are carrying. This picture appeared in DNA today.

I don't think that security checks were a part of it when the aviation industry started; it became a part of it when the risks were exposed. If India was to set up a railway network today, I am sure they would have considered the risks of bombs and other sabotages in trains and would have accordingly made arrangements for security measures so why don’t we do something about it now?

The problem here is that no one is held accountable for his or her job. If a letter was received, whose job was to act on it? Was that person informed about the letter? If yes, what actions that person or group took to prevent it? If they did, why did it still happen? No one is asking these questions. If a truck drier is driving carelessly and kills someone, he is convicted and goes to prison because he was responsible for the death of someone. With the same logic, the person responsible for the security should be convicted and be sent to prison, as he is responsible for the deaths of at least 66 people. Will it happen? No fucking way. It will be brushed under the carpet and if there is a hue and cry over it, the maximum that will happen is that the person responsible will be transferred or worst will be suspended.

We live in a country where we would get so angry with MS Dhoni if he misses a catch. Because Parthiv Patel was not able to keep stumps well, he was thrown out of the team. What happens if he is a poor wicket keeper? A few extra runs are conceded; maybe a batsman gets a second life and worse is that a game is lost. For a lost cricket match, we can get angry with someone and end his career but for a hundred lost lives we are not bothered at all.

Add to any service | del.icio.us |