Saw train mow down people, tragedy unfolded in seconds

Pooja Singh, 19, shudders as she recalls the harrowing incident involving two long-distance trains just hours ago. She was on board a Lucknow-Mumbai express train on Wednesday evening, when some panic-gripped passengers pulled an emergency chain, following rumours of a fire on the train, with some jumping off the train only to be run over by another train on parallel tracks.

- HT Correspondents

LUCKNOW/MUMBAI:

"I was travelling with my mother in the Pushpak Express. We were sleeping when people began screaming. Someone said that the train had caught fire. My mother took me near a door and told me to jump, but I was scared and couldn't. My heart sank as I saw passengers standing on the track getting hit by another train," recalled the 19-year-old from Lucknow, who was on her way to Pune, where she studies.

"All this happened so quickly that I could not understand anything," she added.

At least 12 passengers were killed and several others were injured in a freak accident after they jumped off the 12533 Pushpak Express in panic amid rumours of a fire in a coach, and were mowed down by the 12627 Bengaluru-New Delhi Karnataka Express running on the adjacent tracks in Jalgaon district of Maharashtra around 4.30 pm, officials said.