Railways to manufacture 8-coach Vande Bharat trains

Aimed at providing faster connectivity to smaller cities, Indian Railways has decided to manufacture 64 Vande Bharat trains with eight coaches each.

At present, railways is producing Vande Bharat trains with 16 coaches. However, railways found that these 16 coaches trains are sometimes not able to run at full capacity as the occupancy rate is less in some routes. To make the train operation financially viable, the government has decided to produce smaller Vande Bharat trains, said a railway official here.

The railway maintained that the production of the 16-coach Vande Bharat Express will continue. The 16-coach trains will serve routes connecting bigger cities while 8 coaches Vande Bharat will serve smaller cities, said the official.

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At present 15 Vande Bharat trains are under operation and in some routes passenger capacity is low, said the official.

The traffic directorate has finalised routes for running the eight-coach Vande Bharat trains in due course.

At present Vande Bharat trains are operational with seating arrangements. The railways has already awarded contract to produce 120 sleeper rakes of Vande Bharat Express to the Russian rolling stock company Transmashholding (TMH). The consortium of Russia’s largest rolling stock maker Transmashholding (TMH) and Rail Vikas Nigam Limited (RVNL), a railway public sector firm, has emerged as the lowest bidder for producing the sleeper rakes.

There is huge demand for this train and over 60 MPs have requested Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw to introduce the trains in their respective constituencies and states.