When the Indian Railways decided to run its first Vande Bharat train back in 2019, the route selected was Delhi and Varanasi. It was a 16-coach train. The demand between the two stations was so high that in December 2023, the railways offered another 16-coach train on the route. Now, in a further upgrade, the railways has decided to replace one of these existing trains with a 20-coach Vande Bharat train set from next week, News18 has learnt.
Usually, trains have 22 to 24 coaches. But in case of Vande Bharat, it is either eight- or 16-coach, something similar to Shatabdi Express. But it is the first time the number of coaches has been increased to 20 for Vande Bharat trains. A Ministry official told News18 that the 16-coach Vande Bharat, with two executive class coaches, offers ridership to 1,128 passengers at a time. “With 20 coaches, this will increase around 30% to 1,440 passengers,” they said, demanding anonymity.
News18 has also learnt that there are currently four 20-coach Vande Bharat trains with the Indian Railways, including two with the Northern Railways. Official documents seen by News18 show that one 20-coach Vande Bharat was manufactured each month starting from May.
The first one was allocated to the Ministry, while those manufactured in June and July were allocated to Northern Railways. The last one – allocated in August – was given to the Eastern Railways.
While one of these 20-coach train sets has been allocated to the Delhi-Varanasi route, railways is yet to disclose the routes for the remaining train sets. Last month, the trial run for the 20-coach Vande Bharat train was conducted on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad route – where two 16-coach Vande Bharat trains are already operational.
So far, the Vande Bharat trains had either 16 or eight coaches. In a standard 16-coach Vande Bharat, there are eight motor cars, four trailer cars and two non-driving trailer cars and two driving trailer cars. There are two classes in Vande Bharat trains – Chair Car and Executive Class. In the 16-coach train, only two are Executive Class, while 14 are chair cars. In the eight coach Vande Bharat, there is only one executive class.
The Ministry is also planning for 24-coach train sets. Last month, the railways reworked its Rs 35,000-crore tenders for Vande Bharat. As against 16-coach 120 train sets, now the Ministry wants 24-coach 80 Vande Bharat train sets.
POLL-BOUND JHARKHAND IN FOCUS
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will flag off 10 new Vande Bharat trains from Jamshedpur this Sunday. Earlier this week, Union Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan announced that PM Modi will visit Jamshedpur on September 15. These trains will have either eight or 16 coaches.
Jharkhand, which will have assembly polls likely around year-end, will get at least three new Vande Bharat trains, officials have confirmed. At least two of these trains will be from Tata Nagar – one for Patna (Bihar) and another for Brahmapur (Odisha). Another train will be between Bidhnath Dham in the state to Varanasi. Both the cities are home to Jyotirlingas.
Jharkhand already has three Vande Bharat trains – all from Ranchi. The capital city is connected with Patna, Howrah and Varanasi.
While the railways is yet to announce the new trains and routes, News18 has also learnt that there will be three trains for Odisha as well, including the Tata Nagar–Brahmapur. The other routes will be Rourkela-Howrah and Durg-Visakhapatnam.
Odisha already had three operational Vande Bharat, including two from Puri – one each for Rourkela and Howrah and another between Bhubaneswar and Visakhapatnam.
Last month, three new Vande Bharat trains were added to the fleet taking the tally to 54. As of date, around 110 Vande Bharat Express train services are operational across the country, extending connectivity to close to 300 districts.
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