New train, old story: Taps, carpets stolen on Mahamana Express' maiden journey
Railway officials at Vadodara found the train in a bad state with a number of taps, hand showers, carpets missing and some toilets and seats defaced, according to a report in The Times of India.
A couple of months after the Mumbai-Goa Tejas Express was vandalised on its first journey, the Varanasi-Vadodara Mahamana Express suffered a similar fate on its first trip.
Railway officials at Vadodara found the train in a bad state with a number of taps, hand showers, carpets missing and some toilets and seats defaced, according to a report in The Times of India.
According to the report, three lavatory taps, four hand showers and two carpets were missing. There were also scratches on many seats and some mirrors were broken.
The train was flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday and Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal was present when the train left Vadodara station on its maiden journey.
With the general compartments in the worst state, a railway official was quoted by TOI questioning if passengers were ready to use the “advanced facilities”.
Earlier, the Mumbai-Goa Tejas Express -a high-end superfast train - also met a similar fate where even headphones provided to passengers, were stolen and some LED screens used for infotainment were damaged.
The latest Mahamana Express has advanced passenger amenities such as modular toilets with dustbins, odour control, exhaust fans, upscale taps and hand showers, LED lights, ergonomically-designed berths and seats, GPS integration for information, window blinds, among other things. The Railways claim the interiors to be “world-class”.
It offers passengers the full range of the general second-class, sleeper-class, AC-2 tier and First-AC coaches.
This is the third route of the Mahamana Express. The other two run on the Varanasi-New Delhi and Bhopal-Khajuraho routes.
The train was named after Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya "Mahamana", a freedom fighter and education activist. He is the founder of the eminent Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi.
The weekly Vadodara-Varanasi Mahmana Express will depart from Varanasi every Friday and from Vadodara every Wednesday, connecting the two cities in 27 hours 30 minutes time.
