Passengers killed in their sleep

PENUKONDA: Sources say while there have been many incidents of vehicles hitting trains at unmanned level crossings, never has such an accident occurred, where passengers died in the train after being crushed by a rock from a vehicle.

The Congress MLA representing Devdurga in Raichur district was travelling to his native constituency from Bengaluru. His son, Mr B.T. Naik, is the sitting MP of Raichur in Karnataka.

Passengers in the other bogies, mainly S-1, S-2 and S-3, which had derailed, had no idea what had happened and were unable to inform the police and ambulance services for an hour.

“From the sound, I feared that a bomb had gone off in the train. Nobody in S-1 had any clue,” said Chandru from Raichur district. Another passenger said they had to get down using the light from their mobile phones.