Mamata to flag off 19 trains on Feb 7

After flagging off the fastest train to run on Indian tracks, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee wants to inaugurate trains at record speed as well. She has chosen February 7 to start off as many as 19 new train services. Out of these, 12 are brand new trains while seven others will get extended routes.

According to Railway ministry sources, Banerjee is in a hurry to start the train services she had announced in her Budget in July 2009. In her Budget, she had announced as many as 57 new trains including the 14 Duranto (non-stop) services. Along with this, the Railway Minister had promised to extend the routes of another 27 trains. As her next Budget is barely a few weeks away, Banerjee needs to implement what she had announced earlier, before unveiling another set of new trains in the 2010-11 Budget on February 24.

The list of new trains includes two Duranto services and a Shatabdi Express. The two new Durantos will run on the routes of Lucknow-New Delhi and Allahabad-New Delhi. She will inaugurate a Kanpur-New Delhi Shatabdi Express as well.

Such is the rush that she has chosen Kanpur (North Central Railway) as the single platform to flag off trains that fall in the jurisdiction of far away Northeast Frontier Railway (headquarters at Guwahati) or Southern Railway (Chennai). In fact, apart from the Konkan Railway zone, the programme schedule of the minister at Kanpur has been sent to the General Managers (Operating) of all other 16 railway zones of this country. All the trains will pass through Uttar Pradesh, many stopping at Kanpur.

In the internal circular of the Railway Board sent to the GMs, the Railway Board says, “If required, the above trains may be planned as special services for inaugural run and should pick up its regular service subsequently.” Some Railway officials see this note as an indication that while some of the trains may be inaugurated in principle, regular services may not begin in near future.

Banerjee had announced a slew of new trains in her Budget last year. While Banerjee has implemented her promises like Yuva Express, ladies special trains, Izzat schemes, she has so far been able to run only six out of her 14 pet Duranto trains. Some other trains promised in her last year’s Budget are also awaiting the green signal.