Mumbai: Before the rail overbridge collapsed on the Western Railway (WR) tracks in Andheri on Tuesday, a Twitter user had warned the Railways and its minister Piyush Goyal almost about 11 months back. Although, no attention was paid to the message and there was no action taken.
Vishal Tandel, the Twitter user, had tweeted about the dilapidated condition of the bridge last year. In the tweet, along with three pictures of the bridge, he had highlighted the bridge’s condition and had urged the railway minister to act on it. “Respected @PiyushGoyal ji @indianrailway__ the ROB beneath is in dilapidated condition at andheri platform no 8, for information n action pl,” he tweeted on September 5 last year.
Respected @PiyushGoyal ji @indianrailway__ the ROB beneath is in dilapidated condition at andheri platform no 8, for information n action pl pic.twitter.com/51ZMClwOre
— Vishal Tandel (@VTDaman) September 5, 2017
The user is a political leader from Daman and Diu and belongs to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Some users even commented on the tweet saying, “Even after a BJP leader had forewarned the Railways, they did not pay attention beacuse the government is busy with Bullet Train.”
Railway Minister Piyush Goyal, after the incident on Tuesday, said, “It is an unfortunate incident, I have ordered an inquiry into this. Commissioner of Rail Safety will give report in 15 days.” He also went on to add that a corpus of Rs 65,000 crore will be set aside to enhance safety measures in Mumbai suburban railway network.