Twelve people have died in India after train passengers fleeing rumors of a fire jumped onto the tracks and were hit by another train.

At least 12 train passengers died on Wednesday after they were hit by another train on a nearby railway line in western India after they jumped from their trains in panic to escape what was rumored to be a fire, the Press Trust of India reported.

At least six other people were injured and taken to nearby hospitals, the news agency quoted police officer Dattatraya Karale as saying.

The accident happened in Maharashtra State, near the Pardhade railway station, 255 kilometers southwest of Mumbai, India’s financial capital.

PTI said the victims jumped on the Pushpak Express train, which had stopped after other passengers pulled the emergency chain. Those alighting were hit by another train near the railway line, PTI quoted railway spokesperson Swapnil Nila as saying.

“Our first information is that there were sparks in one of the coaches of Pushpak Express due to ‘hot axle’ or ‘brake-binding’ (jamming), and some passengers panicked. They pulled the chain, some of them jumped down. At the same time, the “Karnataka Express was passing through the adjacent track,” a railway official told PTI.

Despite the government’s efforts to improve railway safetyhundreds of accidents happen every year Indian Railwayswhich is the largest railway network under one management in the world.

In 2023, two passenger trains collided after leaving eastern India, killing more than 280 people and injuring hundreds in one part of the country. the most dangerous train wrecks for decades.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is focused on modernizing the British colonial-era railway network in India, which is now the world’s most populous country with 1.42 billion people.