Amrit Bharat Express impresses monk, patient and migrant labourers in its inaugural run

According to a railway official, tickets are not sold on the inaugural run of Amrit Bharat Express. The train, which is scheduled to take approximately 42 hours to complete its journey, will start its commercial run on January 7.

Kharagpur:A sadhu (monk), a patient, and some migrant laborers were among people who enjoyed a joyride to different destinations on the inaugural run of the Malda-SMVT Bengaluru Amrit Bharat Express.

Divyanath, a septuagenarian monk, who was on his way to Kamakhya, boarded the Amrit Bharat Express on way to Puri Jagannath Temple when he saw the train at Bardhaman station in West Bengal. "I was at Bardhaman to take a train to Guwahati to visit the Kamakhya temple there, but when I saw this new train heading south, I decided to board it and visit the Jagannath Temple in Puri," the monk told this correspondent while sitting in one of the gleaming new bogies of the new rake on Saturday evening.

Divyanath said he had embarked on this path of spiritualism when he was in his teens. His guru's ashram is located in Panipat, Haryana. He said he has been traveling across the country from Himachal to Kanyakumari and from Gujarat to Nagaland for several decades. "I used to travel by trains drawn by steam engines, and now I am in this beautiful new coach. New things will continue to evolve as time passes," he said.

With only a small sack and a wooden stick as his belongings, Divyanath emphasised there should be no differences among people based on religion, caste, or creed. "We all belong to Bharat, whether Hindu, Muslim, or Sikh. We are all of the same country. Why should there be any conflict between any of us?" he said.

Motor mechanic Amit Bairagi, accompanying his wife, was heading to Bengaluru for a medical reason. He considered himself lucky to have obtained permission to board the Amrit Bharat Express since it would have been difficult to get a reservation on such a short notice. "My wife had a medical condition in 2019, and after receiving treatment at a hospital in Bengaluru, she was fine. However, a recurrence occurred suddenly the day before yesterday, and we need to reach the hospital soon," Bairagi said.

He explained that they only learned about the inaugural run of the train on Friday and managed to obtain a pass just in time to travel from Rampurhat station in Birbhum district. Tony Mondal, who works as an unskilled laborer at a construction firm in Bengaluru, was among around 20 others of the same profession who received a free pass to travel to the Karnataka capital from Malda.

After working as a migrant labourer in Bengaluru for three years, Tony had returned home to Baishnabnagar in Malda district for a family function. "We came to Malda station after learning about the inaugural run of the train, and we were given free passes to travel on it," said his companion Sujan Mondal, who saw the ticket price savings as a blessing.

According to a railway official, tickets are not sold on the inaugural run of a train. The train, which is scheduled to take approximately 42 hours to complete its journey, will start its commercial run on January 7. These migrant workers, who travel between their homes and workplaces every six months or so, described it as a magnificent experience to travel on the new train with its ergonomically designed toilets, snazzy upholstery, and other facilities, compared to the "nightmare" of traveling in the general compartment of some other trains.

The train's rakes have radium-illuminated flooring strips, CCTV surveillance for safe travel, mobile charging points, standalone passenger announcements, and public information systems. The public address system is operated by the train guard, according to South Eastern Railway spokesperson Aditya Kumar Chaudhary.

Several school students were also given joyrides for short durations on the train, one of the two Amrit Bharat Express trains inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday. "After assessing passenger demand, the appropriate authorities will consider increasing the frequency of the train and introducing AC coaches," Chowdhury said.

The Amrit Bharat Express consists of 22 non-AC coaches, including 12 sleeper class coaches, eight general coaches, and two luggage rakes. It will have two WAP-5 locomotives manufactured by Chittaranjan Locomotive Works (CLW) at the front and rear ends in a push-pull configuration to ensure faster acceleration and eliminate the need to switch locomotives at stations, Chowdhury added.

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