In a gesture marking Onam, the Railways has presented Kerala with a second Vande Bharat train, which has been assigned to the Palakkad division. The Southern Railway is set to acquire eight reconfigured coaches for the train from the Chennai Integral Coach Factory.
Though the route for this new service remains undecided by the Southern Railway, insiders hint at the possibility of the train being deployed on a route starting from Mangaluru, heading towards destinations like Goa, Ernakulam, Thiruvananthapuram, or Coimbatore. The Southern Railway Board will ultimately determine the final route.
For quite some time, Kerala has been pressing for a second Vande Bharat train, and it seems their request has been heeded. Notably, the Thiruvananthapuram-Kasaragod route stands as one of the busiest in the country. As of the end of June, all states with electrified railway tracks have been provided with Vande Bharat trains.
The demand for Vande Bharat services extends to various routes including Mangaluru-Thiruvananthapuram, Ernakulam-Bengaluru, Tirunelveli-Chennai, and Coimbatore-Thiruvananthapuram. Despite the Railway Minister’s announcement that the second train will run in the opposite direction of the Thiruvananthapuram-Kasaragod Vande Bharat, it might find its starting point at Mangaluru due to the lack of maintenance facilities at Kasargod. The distance between Mangaluru and Thiruvananthapuram is approximately 634 km via Kottayam, and trains currently take anywhere from 11 to 15 hours to traverse this route.
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