Delhi-Lucknow Tejas Express Is India’s First Privately Operated Train: Privatisation Hits Indian Railways?

And, the decks are finally cleared.

Privatization has started in Indian Railways, and it has begun in a gradual way.

Semi-high speed and fully air-conditioned: Tejas Express running between New Delhi and Lucknow has become India’s first privately operated train.

This is a historic moment for Indian Railways.

Tejas Express: India’s First Privately Operated Train

As per fresh reports coming in, Tejas Express will become India’s first privately owned train. This is a semi-superfast train and will run between Lucknow and New Delhi.

Note here, that Tejas Express between Lucknow and Delhi was announced in 2016, but couldn’t start due to operational issues. In the latest timetable update, Tejas Express has been mentioned, which means that now, private operators will run this train.

As per reports, two sets of this train has been parked at Anandnagar Railway Station in UP, and soon, tenders will be floated on a national level to select the private operators who will be running this train between Lucknow and New Delhi.

A senior official said, “These two trains will be given on an experimental basis and we hope that within the next 100 days, we will be able to run at least one of them. The idea was to identify routes which have low congestion and connect important tourists spots. The second main too will be identified soon,”

This also means that privatization of Indian Railways has finally begun, which had been long pending. Railways Employees had been opposing this step, despite Indian  Railways making plans to privatize Shatabdi Express and Rajdhani Express as well.

100 Day Plan Of Indian Railways Is In Full Swing

The privatization of this first train: Tejas Express between Lucknow and New Delhi can be described as among of the most important aspects of the new 100-days plans for Indian Railways.

As we had shared earlier, the new 100-days plan from Indian Railways is indeed disruptive, and several interesting plans and projects have been included in this.

The proposal to reduce Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Howrah journey by 5 hours, privatization of trains, making Rajdhani, Shatabdi Express jolt-free, corporatization of engine manufacturing among others are some of the crucial plans under 100-Days scheme.

We will keep you updated, as we receive more updates.