MUMBAI, January 25: A woman and her four daughters were run over by a suburban train near Kalyan this morning. Her husband, another daughter and a son escaped narrowly. The body of the youngest daughter, whom her mother tried to toss to safety, is yet to be recovered.The family of eight - Bethiladevi Jaiswal (38), Lachmi (2), Bindeswari (3), Rajeshwari (5) and Manudevi (6), Kaushalkumar (45), Purushottam (10) and Parvati (9) - was walking on the tracks after getting off the Mahanagri Express at an unscheduled stop between Shahad and Kalyan. It was a foggy morning, and when they first saw the train's headlights it was just a few metres away and they were on a narrow bridge over the Waldhuni nullah. ``We were enveloped in thick fog as we walked along the tracks...it was difficult to see beyond a few feet. Only when we were in the middle of bridge did we realise that there was a train behind us,'' recalls Kaushalkuamr Jaiswal.
The family, which was walking in single file holding hands, panicked. ``I had
almost made it to the other end of the bridge, so I pulled Purushottam and Parvati aside and began shouting to my wife to hurry up,'' said Jaiswal.
Bethiladevi, by this time was screaming as she saw the train inching towards her daughters who were following her. And then Bindiya slipped and fell. Her mother now stopped running and tried to toss Lachmi to her husband, but missed. Lachmi fell into the nullah below the bridge, even as the train mowed down her sisters and mother. The corpses were retrieved by the police and sent to the Rukminibai Municipal Hospital for post mortem. Lachmi's body was yet to be recovered at the time of going to press.
The Jaiswals are residents of the Gautam Nagar slums, located behind the Century Chemical Factory. The slum is located on a piece of marshy land reclaimed from the Waldhuni nullah, and can only be accessed by crossing the tracks. Such macabre accidents are a regular feature in the stretch between the loco shed and Shahad. On an average four to five such mishaps
take place every month, according to the Kalyan police. The long periods for which locals and long-distance trains halt here provoke commuters to alight or board trains. In the mornings in particular, school children from Shahad and Ambivli alight here to take a short cut to their schools.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
