On Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off nine Vande Bharat trains amid rumors that many of the previous launches had been planned with an eye on the elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Telangana, which will take place before the Lok Sabha elections in 2024, reports News18.
The number of trains allocated to the states that will be voting suggests otherwise, despite the Railway Ministry's denial of the connection between the planning of train launches across states and routes and elections.
Since April 1, the Railway Ministry has introduced at least 15 new Vande Bharat trains, and nine more will begin operating now.
Three of the 15 new Vande Bharat trains have been delivered to Madhya Pradesh, which is governed by the BJP. Two of these trains are intrastate trains. The state received its first Vande Bharat in April, and two more trains, all departing from Bhopal, were flagged off in June. The first train improved Bhopal's connectivity with Delhi. The second and third trains provided better service towards Jabalpur and Indore. However, no new Vande Bharat train was launched in Madhya Pradesh today.
Rajasthan received its first intrastate Vande Bharat on Sunday, which will connect Jaipur and Udaipur. Rajasthan is currently governed by the Congress and is a crucial state for the Bhartiya Janata Party. Since April, Rajasthan has received three Vande Bharat trains. In April, the state received its first superfast train, which runs between Ajmer and Delhi. Another train connecting Jodhpur and Sabarmati in Gujarat was given to the state in July.
Seven of these 15 trains have been allocated to states, including Andhra Pradesh and Odisha, that will hold elections in late 2023 or early 2024.
The first Vande Bharat arrived in Odisha in May, passing between Puri and Howrah. The state will hold both Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in the first half of 2024. With the introduction of the new set of trains, it will now have a dedicated train running between Puri and Rourkela.
West Bengal, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu could present a challenge for the BJP as the Lok Sabha elections approach in the coming months.
The second Vande Bharat train arrived in Kerala on Sunday after the first one arrived there in April. With the exception of just one stop, it will follow the same route as before. Only Kerala has two intrastate trains that travel to Kasaragod and Trivandrum Central, which are both the same destinations.
Following the arrival of two additional trains in May, West Bengal, which received its first Vande Bharat in December 2022, received two additional trains on Sunday.
Similar to other states, Tamil Nadu received its first train in November 2022 and its second in April 2023. The fleet now includes two additional trains. Two of these four trains are interstate. Four specific Vande Bharat trains will now run between Howrah and Chennai.
The need and demand factors are used to determine the train routes a ministry official told the publication. “All the states are now connected with Vande Bharat trains. Polls have no role in Railways’ approval of routes,” the official added on condition of anonymity.
The nine 8-coach Vande Bharat trains that have been launched today are : Rourkela-Puri, Udaipur-Jaipur, Kasaragod-Thiruvananthapuram, Ranchi-Howrah, Patna-Howrah, Tirunelveli-Chennai, Hyderabad-Bengaluru, Vijayawada-Chennai, and Jamnagar-Ahmedabad.
In total, 34 Vande Bharat trains are operational as of now.