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Railway traffic on the Guwahati-Delhi and Guwahati-Howrah routes of the NF Railway, suspended following a head on collision between a goods train and a stationary passenger train at 2240 hours on Monday at Kamakhya station near Guwahati, was restored at 0800 hours on Tuesday.
A NF Railway spokesman told rediff.com that the accident was most definitely due to the driver of the goods train, coming from Goalpara, having overshot the red signal and ramming into the stationary Sealdah-bound Kanchanjunga Express.
The Kanchanjunga Express had left the Guwahati railway station at 2215 hours, 15 minutes behind schedule.
Kamakhya, on the city outskirts, was its first stop. The Guwahati-bound North East Express, coming from New Delhi, was also waiting in another track when the accident occurred. However, no one from that train was injured.
Two parcel vans and the engine of the Kanchanjunga jumped the rails following the impact with the goods train.
An accident relief train immediately rushed to the spot along with top officials of the NF Railway, which is headquartered less than a kilometre from the accident site.
Those killed include Ram Nath, a jawan of the Government Railway Police, and an as-yet unidentified passenger.
Several persons, including the assistant driver of the Kanchanjunga Express, were injured in the incident. They have been admitted to the Maligaon Railway Hospital in Guwahati.
Immediate arrangements were made to transport passengers of both the Kanchanjunga Express and the North East Express to the Guwahati railway station.
A mandatory departmental enquiry has been ordered into the collision, NF Railway officials said.
This is a second incident involving a passenger train and a goods train coming on the same track near Guwahati in the past two months.
Earlier on December 12, the New Delhi-bound Rajdhani Express barely avoided a head-on collision with the Kanchanjunga Express near the Kamakhya station following prompt action by an alert gateman.
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