It is indeed a pity that in our country, a speed increase of a mere 10 km/h is given so much publicity!! When I first heard of a high speed trail run, I thought the run would be at least at 200 km/h; the current run at 160 km/h is laughable at best!
For the last almost 30 years, the progress made by the Indian Railways in the speed of trains has been in miserable aliquots of 10 km/h or so. We used to run the Mumbai Rajdhani at 120 km/h in 1982-1994 or so, when the speed increased to 130 km/h, to match that of the Howrah Rajdhani Exp. In the 1980s, the Delhi-Jhansi Shatabdi Exp was introduced with great fanfare by the then Railway Minister Mr Madhavrao Scindia, at a speed of 145 km/h. However, due to the pitiable state of the tracks, the speed was promptly reduced to 130 km/h, when the train was extended till Bhopal. It was only in the late 2000s when the speed was "suddenly" increased to 150 km/h till Agra. The train started reaching Agra in about 115 minutes. However, due to ever increasing halts of the train and haphazard maintenance of tracks at every 20-30 km stretch (Caution zones), the train could never maintain its top speed. The running time between Delhi and Agra was then increased to 128 minutes.
The crux of the matter is that Indian Railways lacks the basic concept of high speed trains. It is an organization which is actually not working for the public, but to appease its political masters. Any revolutionary step in the direction of reducing the travel time by increasing train speed can never see the light of the day since there would be thousands of political aspirations which would effectively block the proposal. Secondly, the Indian Railway traffic service has a typically lopsided logic of its own. To illustrate my point, let me give the example of the 12951 Mumbai Rajdhani Exp and the 22209 Mumbai Duronto Exp. Rajdhani, with five official halts (BVI, ST, BRC, RTM, KOTA), takes 15 hours 50 minutes for the distance between BCT and NDLS, while a so called non-stop train of the same Rajdhani category, the Duronto, takes 17 hours 40 minutes for the same distance!! It defies all logic!! Plain idiosyncratic behaviour of the Railway authorities, which challenges the sensibilities of any right thinking, balanced person.
High speed trains need a completely separate infrastructure, planning and execution of the project. They cannot run on the political whims of ill-informed people. My humble submission to the Chairman of the Railway Board is that he should take some lessons from SNCF and Eurorail - how much of technical knowhow and sincere willpower is required to get a high speed train.
I also request the Railway authorities to stop mocking the Indian citizens by jumps of a miniscule 10 km/h in train speeds. Moreover, stop making India a laughing stock for the entire developed world!! more
For the last almost 30 years, the progress made by the Indian Railways in the speed of trains has been in miserable aliquots of 10 km/h or so. We used to run the Mumbai Rajdhani at 120 km/h in 1982-1994 or so, when the speed increased to 130 km/h, to match that of the Howrah Rajdhani Exp. In the 1980s, the Delhi-Jhansi Shatabdi Exp was introduced with great fanfare by the then Railway Minister Mr Madhavrao Scindia, at a speed of 145 km/h. However, due to the pitiable state of the tracks, the speed was promptly reduced to 130 km/h, when the train was extended till Bhopal. It was only in the late 2000s when the speed was "suddenly" increased to 150 km/h till Agra. The train started reaching Agra in about 115 minutes. However, due to ever increasing halts of the train and haphazard maintenance of tracks at every 20-30 km stretch (Caution zones), the train could never maintain its top speed. The running time between Delhi and Agra was then increased to 128 minutes.
The crux of the matter is that Indian Railways lacks the basic concept of high speed trains. It is an organization which is actually not working for the public, but to appease its political masters. Any revolutionary step in the direction of reducing the travel time by increasing train speed can never see the light of the day since there would be thousands of political aspirations which would effectively block the proposal. Secondly, the Indian Railway traffic service has a typically lopsided logic of its own. To illustrate my point, let me give the example of the 12951 Mumbai Rajdhani Exp and the 22209 Mumbai Duronto Exp. Rajdhani, with five official halts (BVI, ST, BRC, RTM, KOTA), takes 15 hours 50 minutes for the distance between BCT and NDLS, while a so called non-stop train of the same Rajdhani category, the Duronto, takes 17 hours 40 minutes for the same distance!! It defies all logic!! Plain idiosyncratic behaviour of the Railway authorities, which challenges the sensibilities of any right thinking, balanced person.
High speed trains need a completely separate infrastructure, planning and execution of the project. They cannot run on the political whims of ill-informed people. My humble submission to the Chairman of the Railway Board is that he should take some lessons from SNCF and Eurorail - how much of technical knowhow and sincere willpower is required to get a high speed train.
I also request the Railway authorities to stop mocking the Indian citizens by jumps of a miniscule 10 km/h in train speeds. Moreover, stop making India a laughing stock for the entire developed world!! more
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There are a lot of private enterprises running successfully, for example L&T. But privatization can not solve problem. Within the existing set up Moidi government will improve the Railways. Funding is not a problem in India. India has enough money to manage itself more
Jul 07
I was not talking for population but my point was that we want to utilise rail but want others to fund our journey. more
Jul 07
Dr.Kamal, I think you are talking about population explosion. Let me say what is the status in Tamil Nadu. Here population is no more a problem. Family with more than 2 children is very rare to find. Every body has some work or the others, except who are lazy. Many youngsters are coming to Tamil Nadu to work here, since in Tamil Nadu, there is a shortage of labor force. more
Jul 06
It is prestigious to have bullet train. But ours is a land of Mahatma. Mahatma used to say, we should have appropriate technology. I would like to invest money in our children, make all the schools to gives two means a day for all the children, so that there is no child labor, our children or healthy and intellectuals. I am prepared to reach my destinations few hours later than Chinese do, but I want our children live happily and healthy more
Jul 05
