“Congress, with the help of its troll army on social media, raises false claims. Are they trying to instil fear in the hearts of the 2 crore people who travel by railways every day?” asked Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.
“When Mamata Banerjee was the Railway Minister, she used to report the accident numbers decreasing from 0.24 to 0.19. People used to clap in the House, and today, when it has decreased from 0.19 to 0.03, they cast such blame. Will this country run in this way?” the Minister asked.
Multiple incidents of train derailments have been reported in India in the past few days, with the latest being on July 30 near Jamshedpur in Jharkhand. Two persons were killed and 22 others were injured after 18 coaches of the Howrah-Mumbai Mail derailed there.
The Congress alleged that in June and July alone, the "Fail Minister" has "overseen three accidents" that have cumulatively cost 17 lives, but there is "no accountability" in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's new India.
During the Minister's speech, Rashtriya Loktantrik Party MP Hanuman Beniwal said, "You are a reel minister, you are a derail minister."
Vaishnaw turned around and angrily told Beniwal, "You please shut up". "We're not just people who make reels, we're people who work hard," he said, responding to the Opposition MPs.
The Opposition has been mocking Vaishnaw as the 'Reel Minister', accusing him of focusing on social media image rather than on-ground work to improve the railway infrastructure.
The Minister claimed that during the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, the annual average number of accidents was 171, which has gone down by 68 percent during 10 years of the BJP government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"Those who are shouting here must be asked why they were not able to install Automatic Train Protection (ATP) even for 1 km during their 58 years in power. Today, they dare to raise questions,” Minister Vaishnaw said in the Lower House.
He alleged that those who are “busy making reels with locomotive drivers did nothing during their tenure," referring to Rahul Gandhi's visit to loco pilots in Delhi on July 7.
A Delhi court on Thursday rejected the anticipatory bail plea of former trainee IAS officer Puja Khedkar, who is accused of cheating and forgery of documents to secure selection in the Civil Service Examination. This comes a day after the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) cancelled her candidature amid a massive controversy.
During the hearing, Khedkar claimed that she was being targeted for filing a sexual harassment complaint against an officer and wanted the anticipatory bail "to establish her innocence". The prosecution opposed the application, saying that she has "cheated the system".
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