Train derailment: Injured passengers look for lost kin

Writhing in acute pain, 50-year-old Neelkantha is praying from his hospital bed and asking doctors and nurses about the condition of his old mother and teen-aged son, who were travelling with him in the Coromandel Express that derailed near Jajpur on Friday evening.

A native of Chennai and working in Howrah, Neelkantha was going home to attend his cousin's marriage, but now undergoing treatment at the SCB Medical College Hospital here.

He is a worried man. Not bothering about his broken leg and head injury, he is more concerned about his son and 80-year-old mother, whom he has not met ever since the tragedy struck.

Like him, many injured passengers currently undergoing treatment are anxious to know about the condition of their relatives travelling in the ill-fated train.

Activists drawn from various voluntary organisations are trying hard to relocate the separated relatives from different wards of the hospital and comforting each wailing injured by bringing "get well soon" messages from other relatives.

The hospital staff too on their part are providing yeomen service to each injured. "We are trying our best to treat each injured member of a family in the same ward so as to bring down their anxiety level," said a doctor.