People as saviours

Shahira Naim in Kanpur

A dazed Ashok Kumar, a resident of Doodi Bazar Patna, lies on bed number 30 of ward number 1 of Lala Lajpat Rai Hospital in Kanpur. He wonders how he survived, unlike the dozen who travelled with him and his wife on a pilgrimage to Shirdi and Mahakali temple in Ujjain on November 11. They had boarded S1 coach of Indore-Patna Express at Ujjain. His world came crashing down early morning on November 20. A salesman in a private firm, Ashok Kumar grieves how and, more significantly, why his life was spared.

He has four children. “Parmatma ne bachchon ke liye hi bacha liya hoga (god saved me for the sake of my children),” he sobs. Nearly a week after the train crash in which nearly 150 people were killed, 31 patients are recuperating at the Kanpurhospital. Most have orthopaedic and neurological injuries. Thirty-six have been discharged after treatment and gone home.

A strange kind of stoicism pervades the air. The injured share details of the disaster and the loss of their dear ones without betraying any emotion as if they are talking about incidents far removed from them. An employee in a private firm in Indore, Kripa Shankar Rai along with his wife Laxmi and their teenage son were on their way to attend a family wedding in Ghazipur. While the couple survived with multiple fractures, their teenage son could not. Expressionless, the couple struggles to live with the loss without shedding tears. 

By Nov 24, around 147 bodies had been identified and handed to their family members. Only three unidentified bodies remained in Shri Anandeshwar Cold Storage in village Bara on the main National Highway 25, says Commissioner Kanpur Division Mohammad Iftikharuddin.

“We are legally bound to keep such bodies for 72 hours after completing all formalities, including preserving DNA samples. I have instructed to conserve these bodies beyond this period hoping that some relative would claim them. Getting the body and performing their last rites help in the healing process,” said the Commissioner.

The accident has brought out the extraordinarily humane aspect of scores of ordinary citizens who spontaneously came forward to help. The principal and a dozen hostellers of St Vivekanand School, barely 500 metres from the accident site, rushed out in the dark after hearing the loud blast of the crash which shook their entire building. Principal IP Singh said he personally drove the school bus to the site where the rescue operation initially started in headlight of their school buses.

“We arrived just when Pukhrayan chowki in-charge Amar Singh reached the site. My students helped in cordoning off the area to prevent looters. The students collected all belongings and safely kept them in the buses. The relatives came and collected the baggage,” said the principal.  On November 23 the school organized a Shanti Path at the accident site where the students, villagers and some railway officials participated. Similarly, Yogendra Dubey who runs the Shri Anandeshwar Cold Storage, readily cooperated when the district administration asked him to help. Around 40 bodies were kept at the cold storage as there was not enough space in the mortuary.

The accident had occurred in Pukhrayan town in the recently carved out district of Kanpur Dehat, about 60 km from Kanpur city.  As facilities here are still in the nascent district magistrate Kumar Ravi Kant Singh requested Dubey to keep some of bodies till the families arrived. 

Similarly, the Sikh Punjabi Welfare Society in Kanpur came forward to hold round-the-clock langar at the hospital for the large number of relatives and care givers of the 68 patients who were admitted there at one point. Social worker Amarjeet Singh ‘Pammi’said that the Sikh community had also distributed blankets to the injured.

Expressing gratitude for the people who came forward to help, Commissioner Iftikharuddin says that in recognition of their services, he has instructed to get special certificates printed which would be handed to them.