The drivers of a train that missed a signal and ploughed into another train, killing 14 people, were distracted because they were watching cricket on a phone, India’s railways minister has said.
The fatal collision in Andhra Pradesh state in October took place as hosts India played England during the one-day World Cup.
“The recent case in Andhra Pradesh happened because both the loco-pilot and co-pilot were distracted by the cricket match,” Ashwini Vaishnaw said, according to the Press Trust of India news agency.
“Now we are installing systems which can detect any such distraction and make sure that the pilots [train drivers] and the assistant pilots are fully focused on running the train.”
Hundreds of millions of cricket fans in India watched the live broadcast of the match, which the hosts won.
Separately, officials sacked the station master and three other employees after a runaway freight train travelled 40 miles (70km) without a driver last month, the Hindustan Times reported.
The men were removed from their posts for negligence after about 50 carriages barrelled on solo for almost two hours.
India has one of the world’s largest rail networks, and there have been several disasters over the years, the worst in 1981 when a train derailed while crossing a bridge in Bihar state, killing an estimated 800 people. In June 2023, a three-train collision killed nearly 300 people in Odisha state.
India has been investing huge sums of money to upgrade the network with modern stations and electronic signalling systems.
