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A family's trauma

A family of a bank employee in Kannur was yet to come out of the shock from an inaccurate news that a news channel flashed on August 21 night, though the ordeal that the family suffered following the news flash lasted only half an hour. Perhaps, it is only one of the families that experienced the ordeal that night.

According to the bank employee, the channel flashed the news at around 8 p.m. that the Kannur-Kochi Inter City Express and Thiruvananthapuram-Mangalore Parasuram Express collided near Koyilandi and two people were killed. The flash news alarmed his family as he had seen his son off in the train at Thalassery that evening. The seriousness of a train collision accident left the family in dismay. His attempts to call nearby railway stations to get information turned futile as no one responded to the calls, he said. The trauma, he said, lasted till a friend of his living near Koyilandi went to the spot of the `accident' and called him back.

What was more shocking, according to the bank employee, was the fact that the channel had not regretted the mistake. He said he had served a notice on the channel asking it to compensate the trauma he and his family suffered.

MOHAMMED NAZEER

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