Vande Bharat trains developed with indigenous technology, which have gained popularity in the country and abroad, are going to get a place in the general budget of the Central government.
The government will announce production-operation of 250-300 Vande Bharat trains every year. Being a part of the budget, provision for new technology, money, design, speed increase of Vande Bharat semi-high speed train can be made in advance.
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A senior official of the Railway Board said that the Indian Railways’ premium Rajdhani Express-Shatabdi Express, Duronto Express, Superfast, Mail-Express etc. trains will be replaced by Vande Bharat. That is, LHB coaches (about 65 thousand coaches) of premium trains will be completely removed from Indian Railways.
The official said that the first sleeper Vande Bharat train on the lines of Rajdhani Express will start running on the tracks in February 2024. Presently, seating Vande Bharat trains are being run like Shatabdi.
He said that 475 new Vande Bharat trains will be ready by 2025-26. Apart from this, export of Vande Bharat trains start by 2024. In this, the trains will be exported to the countries of South America, East Asia and Europe. These countries have shown interest in semi high speed Vande Bharat trains built with indigenous technology.
However, the exported Vande Bharat trains will run on standard gauge instead of broad gauge because the trains do not run on broad gauge in those countries.
The railway official said that plans are being made to run the Vande Bharat trains with tilted technology on the existing railway routes of Indian Railways. In the tilted technology, the train can run at full speed when the railway track is curved. The speed of the train does not have to be slowed down. The train automatically tilts the curvy railway track. And the railway passengers sitting inside the train will not even realize it whereas the speed of Indian Railways trains is restricted when they are on winding railway tracks.
And on such section the train runs at slow speed. Due to this their average speed decreases while the average speed of trains with tilted technology increases. The official said that out of the 400 Vande Bharat trains announced, 100 trains will be made with tilted technology. Tilted technology trains are being run in countries like Italy, Finland, Russia, Switzerland, China, Germany, Romania, etc.