Are you aware that India will soon have its first bullet train? The first bullet train in the country is currently being built in full force. The government is investing heavily in the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail Corridor, which will be operational in a few years. According to a LiveMint report, the intention is to begin running it in August 2026, according to Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.
All You Need to Know About the Marvellous Bullet Train
About 320 km/hr is the estimated speed of the bullet train. The current top speed restriction is 160 km/h. The first bullet train of India will have three boarding classes, i.e. Standard Class, Business Class, and Grand Class. Hiroshi Suzuki, the Japanese ambassador to India, went to Surat in Gujarat last month to check on the development of the building projects. Suzuki posted on Twitter that “the flagship India-Japan project is now making progress in full swing.”
Some major developments are listed below:
- This significant impending project, which is poised to revolutionise the nation’s rail transportation infrastructure, is being led by Indian Railways.
- India’s first bullet train will operate between Ahmedabad in Gujarat and Mumbai in Maharashtra.
- This project’s route is roughly 508 kilometres long.
- The total cost of the project is close to 2 lakh crores.
- Right now, running the train is intended to begin in August 2026. Once it’s up and running, the plan is to extend the services to a wider and longer segment in the following year, 2027.
- Times Now News reported that this project had made physical progress of 33.68 percent. The desired outcome was to hit 35.77%.
The Bridges of the High-Speed Corridor
In the month of June 2023, the construction crew constructed three river bridges. According to a report by the Economic Times, they have finished 4 bridges altogether in the past six months.
There will be a total of 24 river bridges throughout the circuit. Out of them, 20 are developing in Gujarat, and 4 are developing in Maharashtra.
The Completion
The foundation stone for the project was placed on September 14, 2017, by the prime leaders of India and Japan, following which construction work for a 4,000-employee High-Speed Rail Training Institute (HSRTI) in Vadodara began.
The initial deadline of August 15, 2022, was set by the Indian government and was sadly not met because of problems in acquiring the 825 hectares needed, mostly in Maharashtra.
However, the construction is in full swing, and the project will be completed soon.
