The inaugural run of the semi-high-speed Vande Bharat Express, which will reduce the time taken to travel from New Delhi to the Shri Vaishno Devi Katra station in Reasi district of Jammu and Kashmir by at least four hours, will be flagged off by Union Home Minister Amit Shah on October 3, the Hindustan Times reported.

The first commercial run will be on October 5 and tickets can be now booked on the IRCTC website, Indian Railways announced on Sunday. Earlier, it used to take passengers 12 hours or more to travel between the two cities. Now, they can complete their journey in eight hours.

The train has 16 coaches, including two driver cars, two executive chair cars and 12 chair car coaches. The coaches have separate toilets for passengers with physical disabilities, and an automatic lighting door system.

The minimum fare will be Rs 1,630 and the maximum will be Rs 3,015 in the Delhi-Katra route. For the train from Katra, the fare will be Rs 1,570 for general coaches and Rs 2,965 for the executive ones. It will run on all days except Tuesdays. The train will leave New Delhi at 6 am and reach Katra at 2 pm. It will stop at Ambala Cantonment, Ludhiana and Jammu Tawi for two minutes each, reported News18. The train will start for Delhi at 3 pm and arrive in the national capital at 11 pm.

The train’s trial run on Saturday was successful. “During its speed trial on the Delhi-Kota section, the train touched the mark of 180 km per hour, but we have the permission to run the train at a maximum speed of 160 km per hour only,” station director Tarun Kumar told Hindustan Times. “However, on the Delhi-Katra route, it will run at a maximum speed of 130 km per hour.”

Kumar said all coaches were connected with one another to let passengers move easily. “There are distributed pantries for every coach,” he added. “Besides, the train has vacuum toilets, diffused lighting, hands-free taps, dryers, mobile charging points for every seat and 360 rotatable seats in the executive class.”

Each coach has LED screens highlighting the next train stop, speed and other information. The coaches also have CCTV cameras and an announcement system. “Around 15 to 20 specialised technical staff will be present in the train during the entire journey for dealing with any technical glitch,” Kumar told Hindustan Times.

The train has automatic doors that are controlled by the guard. The station director added that the train halts for only two minutes. “So, if you have come to see off a relative, do not enter the coach as doors will close automatically and one will get stuck inside the train.”

This is the second Vande Bharat train to join the Railways fleet. The first one, which runs from New Delhi to Varanasi, was flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the national capital on February 15. However, it broke down during its first journey.

The train, considered to be India’s fastest, was indigenously built at a cost of around Rs 97 crore. But it was plagued by issues since its trial runs in November. Within days, it was vandalised in Uttar Pradesh – the third time in two months.

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