280 KMPH, Best-In-Class Features; Made-In-India Bullet Trains To Cost Rs... - Check Design Details

In what will drastically reduce the travel time between Indian cities, the Integral Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai, is working closely with BEML, formerly known as Bharat Earth Movers Limited to design and manufacture high-speed trains for Indian tracks. The trains, which may travel as fast as 280 kmph will be manufactured at Rs 28 crore per car, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Wednesday.

"The Integral Coach Factory, Chennai, in collaboration with BEML, is designing and manufacturing high-speed train sets that will have a design speed of 280 kmph," Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw told Parliament.

The success of Vande Bharat trains prompted the Govt to start the project

Vaishnaw, in response to an unstarred question in the Parliament, said that after the success of Vande Bharat trains under the "Make in India" initiative, the Indian Railways (IR) has now taken up designing and manufacturing high-speed train sets. "The manufacturing cost is approximately Rs 28 crore per car (excluding taxes), which is highly competitive compared with other train sets," he said. The Railway Minister was replying to questions raised by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MPs Sudhir Gupta and Ananta Nayak.

According to Vaishnaw, the high-speed train sets will have chair cars with best-in-class features, such as aerodynamic exteriors, sealed gangways, automatic doors, optimum climatic conditions inside compartments for passenger comfort, CCTV, mobile-charging facilities, optimum lighting, fire safety equipment among others. Giving an update on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail Corridor project, Vaishnaw said - “The work of the undersea tunnel (approximately 21 km) has also started.”