Increasing unreserved passenger coaches-INDIAN RAILWAY NEWS
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA
MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS
RAJYA SABHA
QUESTION NO 1404
ANSWERED ON 29.12.2017
Increasing unreserved passenger coaches
1404 Dr. Satyanarayan Jatiya
Will the Minister of RAILWAYS be pleased to state :-
(a) the details of the measures taken to increase the unreserved railway passenger coaches in passenger trains, commencement of new train services and to facilitate safe travel for the common train passengers travelling above 500 kilometres in the country; and
(b) with reference to (a) above, by when weekly Express rail service on every Sunday would be started for the convenience of pilgrims visiting Jyotirlinga at Mahakaleshwar, Ujjain and Omkareshwar, Indore from Delhi and Northern India?
ANSWER
MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS (SHRI RAJEN GOHAIN)
(a) To cater to the needs of passengers of un-reserved segment following endeavors have been made by the Indian Railways:-
(i) As a matter of policy, it has been decided that all the Mail/Express trains (except fully reserved trains like Rajdhani, Shatabdi, Duronto, etc.) introduced after 2007-08, shall have at least 6 general class coaches in their standard composition as per feasibility.
(ii) Operation of fully unreserved services like Jan Sadharan, Janseva, Jan Nayak Express etc. to facilitate un-reserved segment of passenger. In the Railway Budget 2016-17, it has been further announced to introduce Antyodaya Express, which are long-distance, fully unreserved, superfast train services. Accordingly, of the 11 pairs of Antyodaya trains decided to be introduced during the year 2016-17 and 2017-18, four (4) pairs of Antyodaya Express have already been introduced till date.
(iii) In pursuance of the announcements made in the Railway Budget 2016-17, regarding attachment of two to four Deen Dayalu coaches in some long distance trains for unreserved travel to enhance our carrying capacity for the masses, Indian Railways have inducted 321 Deen Dayalu coaches (General Class coaches) in 53 pairs of trains during the year 2016-17. Similarly, during the year 2017-18, 76 Deen Dayalu coaches are being utilized.
In addition to the above, during 2017-18 (till November, 2017) Indian Railways have also utilized about 137 General Class coaches for permanent augmentation of the loads of existing trains (which includes both Passenger and Express train services).
The passenger coaches plying over Indian Railways (IR) have been designed with the necessary safety features considering the operating conditions over IR. Linke Hoffman Busch (LHB) design coaches are of a superior design than Integral Coach Factory (ICF) type coaches and have better safety features like anti-climbing etc. It has been decided that only LHB coaches would be manufactured from April, 2018 onwards.
(b) Presently, there is no proposal to operate weekly train between Delhi and Ujjain/Indore for pilgrims.