Railway minister dismisses reports of delay in Vande Bharat sleeper trains over design

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has dismissed media reports claiming delay in starting the manufacturing process for Vande Bharat sleeper trains due to design clearance issues.

During a media interaction on Thursday (November 28, 2024),Ashwini Vaishnaw said that design was never an issue with the Russian firm roped in to manufacture these train sets.

The reports further said the firm addressed Railway Ministry's concerns with a change in design and sent it to the ministry for clearance, which, however, hasn't responded with its consent.

As per the contracts, the firm is supposed to manufacture 1,920 sleeper coaches.

However, ministry sources said these reports were baseless as the real issues were with regard to the limited manufacturing capabilities of the firm because in Russia, trains have less number of coaches as compared to India.

According to the minister, the firm was clearly told that India has a bigger population so on some routes 24 coaches were needed, while 16 coaches were required on other routes.

Ministry sources said that since trains normally have six to eight coaches in Russia due to less population, the firm wanted to know why we need a train set with 16, 20 or 24 coaches.

The sources said issues have been resolved and the work will start very soon.