Puri-Rourkela and 8 Other Vande Bharat Trains With Improved Amenities Are Flagged Off by PM Modi

Nine Vande Bharat trains linking religious and tourism places across 11 states, including Odisha, were launched off by the prime minister on Sunday via video conference, bringing the total number of these semi-high-speed trains to 34. In addition to other MPs and MLAs, Governor Ganeshi Lal and Union Minister of Education, Skill Development, and Entrepreneurship Dharmendra Pradhan attended an event held at the Bhubaneswar railway station to celebrate the debut of the second Vande Bharat Express for Odisha on the Puri-Rourkela line.

Besides Rourkela-Puri Vande Bharat Express, the eight other trains are Kerala (Kasaragod-Thiruvanthapuram), Rajasthan (Jaipur-Udaipur), Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu (Vijayawada-Chennai), Tamil Nadu (Tirunelveli-Chennai), Gujarat (Jamnagar-Ahmedabad), Jharkhand and West Bengal (Ranchi-Howrah), Telangana and Karnataka (Secunderabad (Kacheguda)-Bengaluru (Yesvantpur) and Bihar and West Bengal (Patna-Howrah).

According to PM Modi, these trains would considerably increase connectivity and encourage tourism throughout India. “There are already 25 Vande Bharat trains operating, and nine more will be added soon. Trains operated by Vande Bharat are becoming more and more well-liked. Already, more than 1,11,00,000 travelers have used them. It won’t be long before all of the country will be connected by Vande Bharat trains.

He further said that the new Vande Bharat Express train has lot more improved and enhanced amenities and features for the comfort of the passengers, along with advanced safety features, including Kavach technology. “Speed, the scale of infrastructure development is matching aspirations of 140 crore Indians…Today people of Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Bihar, West Bengal, Kerala, Odisha, Jharkhand and Gujarat will get the facility of Vande Bharat Express trains. These new Vande Bharat Express trains depict the new energy of the country.”