NE’s 1st Vande Bharat completes trial run between NJP & Assam

Guwahati: The Vande Bharat Express chugged into Guwahti from New Jalpaiguri (NJP) in North Bengal for a trial run on Sunday.
This will be the first Vande Bharat Express that would be operationalise in the northeast and will cover a distance of 408 km between Guwahati and NJP in five hours and fifty minutes as against six hours and thirty minutes taken by the Rajdhani Express, the fastest in the route till date, said Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) chief public relations officer Sabyasachi De.
“Today, we had the first trial run of Vande Bharat between NJP and Guwahati. It will continue to resolve the issues that come up during the trial runs. As and when we find everything fine, the trial runs will stop, and we will go ahead for the formal inauguration after fulfilling the formalities,” De told TOI here.
“The Vande Bharat is ‘computer on wheels’. We want to see if everything is working properly here,” De added.
According to the Railways, the Vande Bharat Express can run up to a maximum speed of 160 kmph and has travel classes like the Shatabdi Express, but with better facilities. The train speed is likely to be limited below 100 kmph on the NJP-Guwahati route, the railway sources said.
The laying of double tracks is yet to be completed up to Guwahati and the same has been completed till the northern part of the city, but it will not hamper the movement of the train, said the Railways.