Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off five more Vande Bharat Express trains from Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh, taking the total number of such express trains to 23. While the trains are designed to run at a speed of 110 kmph to 130 kmph, the average running speed on the ground ranges between 63 to 96 kilometres per hour. With even the newly launched routes adopting the same pattern, the Vande Bharat journey is proving to be much longer than it has to be.
Mr. Modi flagged off trains between Bhopal and Jabalpur, Bhopal and Indore, Goa and Mumbai, Ranchi and Patna and Dharwad and Bengaluru — a bid to connect State capitals of Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Jharkhand, Bihar, Maharashtra and Karnataka.
Information accessed by The Hindu revealed that the average speed of Vande Bharat Express on the Ranchi-Patna route is not more than 63 kmph. A rail distance of 379 km between Ranchi and Patna is currently traversed in 6 hours. However, if the train were to run at its full potential, the travel time can be reduced by half to three hours.
