Medical representative helps seven injured in Odisha train crash reunite with families

Nilotpal Chatterjee, who works with Torrent Pharmaceuticals, told PTI that he went to the Midnapore Medical College and Hospital on Saturday for work and found many people injured in the train tragedy being brought there.

"Out of curiosity, I started enquiring about them and learnt that there are seven people who have lost their mobile phones, and do not remember any contact number of their family members. These are poor people who do not have any belongings left with them after the accident," he said.

"Soon, I posted their photos along with other details on Facebook. And those were shared by thousands of people, and I started getting calls from their relatives or people who know them, besides police and government officials," he said.

Chatterjee, 36, said most of these patients have multiple fractures, and were being not able to even speak properly.

The people he helped connect with their families are Gadadhar Sardar, Kabita Karmakar and Nakul Munda of Gosaba in South 24 Parganas, Naren Chowdhury of Goshthonagar in Malda, Sajjit Das of Alipurduar, Samir Kumar Mondal of Sonarpur in South 24 Parganas and Sudha Mondal of Santiniketan in Birbhum.

Sudha's family could not get in touch with her after the accident on Friday, Chatterjee said, adding that after failing to locate her at the hospitals in Odisha, her son-in-law Debiprasad Ghosh even went to the morgue of AIIMS-Bhubaneswar, thinking of the worst, before finally getting to know about her whereabouts.

He said it was the drive to do something for the people that made him take up the task, for which he has been spending most of the day at the Midnapore Medical College and Hospital.

The families that have been coming here from far-off places to take their loved ones home know nothing about Midnapore.

"We have been helping them with all kinds of things, including food and shelter," he said.

Chatterjee said several organisations, including Leftist organisation 'Red Volunteers', were working at the hospital to help the distraught people.

"We are taking them on stretchers for x-rays and MRIs, getting them medicines and providing all kinds of help that they need to get better," he said.

Three trains -- Shalimar-Chennai Coromandel Express, Bengaluru-Howrah Super Fast Express and a goods train -- were involved in the crash, now being described as one of India's worst train accidents.

The Coromandel Express crashed into a stationary goods train, derailing most of its coaches around 7 pm on Friday. A few passenger wagons of the Coromandel Express whiplashed the last few coaches of the Bengaluru-Howrah SF Express, which was passing by at the same time.

Investigators are looking into possible human error, signal failure and other causes behind the three-train crash that killed 275 people.