This story was written by Joydeep Sarkar and translated from Bengali by Aparna Bhattacharya.
Last week, 12-year-old Mursalim Ali noticed that the soil and pebbles on a railway track near the Bhaluka Road station in Malda had been washed away. As the Tripura-bound Kanchanjunga Express was approaching, he took off his red T-shirt and started waving it, alerting the loco pilot who applied emergency brakes.
The Rs 1,500 that Mursalim Ali received from the Indian Railways for averting a mishap and saving hundreds of passengers on a train wouldn’t cover the round-trip fare for a chair car seat on the Vande Bharat Express from Malda to Kolkata. It would have barely covered the cost of a round-trip fare for an AC 2-tier ticket on the Kanchanjunga Express, the very train which could’ve met with disaster if not for the 12-year-old’s quick thinking.
On the afternoon of September 21, when the Tripura-bound Kanchanjunga Express was approaching the Bhaluka Road station of Malda, Mursalim noticed that the soil and pebbles had been washed away from under the tracks. As the train was approaching, Mursalim took off his red T-shirt and started waving it, alerting the loco pilot, who pulled the emergency brakes. The damaged portion was repaired by the railway staff and the train then left for its destination.
The chief public relations officer (PRO) of the Northeast Frontier Railway had initially denied the boy’s act, claiming that the damage was noticed by railway staff. He later acknowledged and saluted his “approach towards society being a teenager”.
On Monday, the Northeast Frontier Railway issued a press release commending his act as “defined bravery.”
“At one location where soil and the pebbles were washed away by the rain, the boy named Mursalin Seikh, son of a migrant labour of the nearby village was also present in the yard with the railway staff. On noticing a rain damage portion under the tracks, the boy acted sensibly and alerted the loco pilot of an approaching passenger train by waving his red shirt along with other on-duty railway staff,” said Sabyasachi De, chief PRO, the Northeast Frontier Railway.
However, locals of Mursalim’s village, located in the Harishchandrapur-II block of Malda, and even passengers who were on the train contradicted the railway official’s claim. “The Railways is being economical with the truth. There were no railway workers there. That child, with a red handkerchief tied around his waist, halted the train all by himself, and there were seven local people with him. If they hadn’t been there, it could have been a massive disaster,” said Raghav Sen, who was a passenger on the train.
On Monday, Khagen Murmu, the BJP MP from Malda North, visited the boy’s home with a senior railway official and presented him with a cash award of Rs 1,500.
However, the meagre sum sparked widespread criticism from various quarters. Local Trinamool leader Krishnendu Narayan Choudhury said, “This is an utterly heartless government! I am contemplating taking legal action against the railways regarding this issue.”
A defensive Murmu said, “They want to politicise everything. A railway official has already promptly approved the award. We will explore further actions later. They have no genuine concerns; they are merely engaging in opposition for the sake of it.”
The typically active social media accounts of the Indian Railways have opted to downplay the incident. While the Northeast Frontier Railway shared clippings of reports related to their press release on Facebook and X (formerly Twitter), neither the rail ministry nor its minister has shared or reposted it as of the time of filing this report.
Hailing from Puratan Koliyari village in Harishchadrapur, Malda, Mursalim is a seventh-grade student at Wahedpur Junior High School. “I knew that waving a red cloth would alert the driver to stop. That’s why I used my T-shirt. Now, I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the attention,” he told The Wire.
He also received a hero’s welcome at school on Tuesday. The teachers showered him with a backpack, books, stationery, and even a much-coveted geometry box.
Mursalim’s father, Mohammad Ismail, works as a migrant labourer in Gujarat, while his mother, Marjina Bibi, earns a daily wage of Rs 130 as a beedi worker. The family of four resides in dire poverty. Government assistance programs like PM Awas Yojana and the Ujjwala scheme remain elusive.
“We were afraid to see so many leaders and ministers coming to our house. We haven’t done anything wrong. Now I have heard that my son saved a train and people’s lives. He has done the right thing,” said Marjina.
This article has been republished from The Wire with permission. Read the original article here.