Lucknow, Aug. 23: Seven compartments of a Delhi-bound train derailed in Uttar Pradesh today, injuring at least 70 passengers, some of them critically, after the speeding express smashed into a dump truck in the region's second major rail accident in less than a week.

The engine of the Kaifiyat Express also went off the tracks while one sleeper coach fell into a nearby ditch following the impact of the 2:40am crash between Achchleha and Pata railway stations in Auraiya, 190km west of Lucknow.

However, no deaths were reported.

On Saturday, 24 passengers had died when the Puri-Haridwar Utkal Express got derailed in Muzaffarnagar, 650km west of the Uttar Pradesh capital, amid allegations of shoddy repair of the tracks.

Arvind Kumar, principal secretary, home, told the media 74 people were injured in today's accident, four of them seriously. He said the four had been admitted to the Institute of Medical Sciences in Saifai, Etawah, around 50km away from the accident spot that falls under the Allahabad division. The rest have been admitted to hospitals and local health centres in Auraiya.

The affected coaches of the train, which runs between Azamgarh and old Delhi, included two AC compartments and four sleeper coaches. One was a sitting-cum-luggage rake.

Railway minister Suresh Prabhu said he was taking full moral responsibility. "I met the Hon'ble Prime Minister, taking full moral responsibility. Hon'ble PM has asked me to wait," he tweeted.

In another tweet earlier in the day Prabhu said he was "extremely pained by the unfortunate accidents, injuries to passengers and loss of precious lives".

"It has caused me deep anguish," he said.

Sources in the Government Railway Police told this newspaper the dump truck had been deployed to unload sand as work on the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor was going on round the clock.

"The contractor assigned by the railways to unload sand beside the tracks had in fact filled the gaps in the tracks (with sand) so that dump trucks could cross there instead of taking a longer route," a GRP official said.

"It appears that while unloading more sand it got trapped the moment the train was arriving. The driver ran away leaving the truck behind."

Gautam Krishna Bansal, CPRO, North-Central Railways, said it was too early to jump to conclusions. "But it is true that work on the dedicated corridor was going on. We have yet to confirm whether the dump truck was hired for this work. In any case, the driver is guilty of trespassing on railway property."

Train driver S.K. Chauhan, who suffered head injuries, said he had no information about the dump truck. "The train was running at 107km per hour. We saw the truck too late and got little time to apply all the breaks," Chauhan told reporters at Auraiya District Hospital.

When asked why some railway sources were claiming that he had been alerted about the truck, Chauhan said: "I am not a lunatic that I will run the train at full speed if I know that there is a heavy object on the tracks."

Over 40 important trains have been diverted following the accident.