India’s first semi-high speed train, the Vande Bharat Express, was flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi from New Delhi Railway Station on February 15.

“I am grateful to the designers and engineers behind Vande Bharat Express, which will take its first trip from Delhi to Varanasi today. With our sincerity and hard work in the last four-and-a-half years, we have tried to improve the railways,” the PM said.

The PM inspected the train and said he was proud that such a train had been produced indigenously at the Integral Coach Factory, Chennai, in 18 months.

The semi-high speed Vande Bharat Express can run up to a maximum speed of 180 km/h and has travel classes like Shatabdi trains but with better facilities. It aims to provide a totally new travel experience to passengers.

The bookings for the train have begun and it will run commercially from February 17.

The train will leave New Delhi at 6 am and reach Varanasi at 2 pm. On the same day, it will leave Varanasi at 3 pm and reach New Delhi at 11 pm. The Vande Bharat Express will operate for five days a week, except on Monday and Thursday.

From New Delhi to Varanasi, an AC chair car ticket will cost Rs 1,760 and the executive class fare will be Rs 3,310, while in the return journey, a chair car ticket will cost Rs 1,700 and that of a seat in the executive class Rs 3,260. Both are inclusive of catering charges.

The chair car fares are 1.4 times the base price of Shatabdi trains running the same distance and that of the executive class 1.3 times of a first class air-conditioned ticket in the premium train.

The train has 16 AC coaches of which two are executive class. The total seating capacity is 1,128 passengers. It is much more than the conventional Shatabdi rakes of equal number of coaches, thanks to shifting of all electric equipment below coaches.

All coaches are equipped with automatic doors, GPS-based audio-visual passenger information system, on-board WiFi hotspot for entertainment purposes and very comfortable seating. All toilets are bio-vacuum type.

Every coach has a pantry facility to serve hot meals as well as hot and cold beverages. The insulation is meant to keep heat and noise to very low levels for additional comfort.

Adding up the green footprint, the train has a regenerative braking system, which can save up to 30 per cent of electrical energy.