NEW DELHI (Metro Rail News): Prime Minister Narendra Modi had made an announcement on 15th August that 75 Vande Bharat Trains will be launched to connect different parts of the country by August 2023 to mark the ongoing ‘Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav.’
“The country has resolved that 75 Vande Bharat trains will be connecting every corner of the country in 75 weeks of Amrit Mahotsav of Independence,” the Prime Minister said.
Indian Railways is planning to roll out atleast 10 new Vande Bharat Trains connecting 40 cities by August 2022. For achieving the same, Medha Servo Drives Ltd has been told to advance its production plan so that at least two prototypes can be rolled out by March next year following all trials. Medha Servo had won the contract worth INR 2,211 Crores to supply the electrical systems for 44 Vande Bharat Trains in January this year.
Regarding Railway connectivity in North East India, PM Modi said, “Today, we are in the process of writing a new history as far as connectivity to the northeast is concerned. This connectivity is both between hearts and infrastructure. Very soon the job of connecting the capital cities of the northeastern states by rail will be completed.”
Vande Bharat Train is India’s first semi-high speed train with potential to completely change the travel experience for the Indian masses. It is a self-propelled trains which runs on distributed power mechanism and does not require an engine to haul them. As a result, the Vande Bharat Train has faster acceleration and deceleration, helping it to maintain a higher average speed despite stoppages. This ensures that the Vande Bharat takes less time in completing its runs than ordinary loco-hauled trains and is even faster than the Rajdhani and the Shatabdi Trains, wherein time and speed are lost when a train has to stop and gather speed again.
Vande Bharat Trains has modern feature like automatic doors, chair car type sitting, side destination boards, automatic intercommunication door, speakers, mobile and laptop charging sockets, CCTVs, emergency talk back units with networking system, diffused lighting for luggage racks, continuous LED lights, GPS antenna and many more other features.
At present, two Vande Bharat Trains are operational on the Indian Railway network. With a target of 75 Vande Bharat to be made operational by August 2023, Indian Railways will need to execute the contract with speed to meet the deadline.
