Headlines
Prabhu connects Bengaluru to Vaishno Devi shrine
Bengaluru, Jan 29
Railway Minister Suresh
Prabhakar Prabhu Thursday flagged off a premium train here connecting
India's tech hub to Katra town, 13km from Mata Vaishno Devi shrine in
Jammu and Kashmir.
Though Prabhu's predecessor D.V. Sadananda
Gowda announced the weekly express in this fiscal (2014-15) railway
budget in July last year, pressure from devotees of the Hindu goddess
Durga made the mandarins hurry up with the new train which will cover
3,246km in 56 hours and 40 minutes.
"We had to work out the
logistics and schedule for the special inaugural train in the busy time
table, connecting south and north, which makes the trip longest from
here to north India," a South Western Railway (SWR) official told IANS
on the occasion.
Though Prabhu also flagged off three other
weekly premium trains to Kamakhya in Assam, Patna in Bihar and Tatanagar
in Jharkhand, the superfast pilgrim train (# 22679/22680) to Katra will
run every Saturday at 11:30am from Feb 7 and will depart from
Yesvantpur junction in the city's northern suburb.
"It's a great
relief for us, especially senior citizens, to have a direct train to
Katra on the foothills of the Mata Devi shrine. Though the travel is
tedious and over two days, we don't have to alight in Delhi or board
another train en-route or bus from Jammu for the pilgrimage," S.
Gopalacharya, 64, a retired lecturer, told IANS.
With 19 coaches
and a pantry car, the train to Katra atop Tirkuta Hills at 5,300 feet in
the Jammu region, will have 10 halts, chugging through seven-eight
states enroute.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the
Katra station July 14 last year for regular traffic, connecting it to
the national rail network via Jammu station, 50km away from it in the
mountain region.
The three other express trains which will run
under the premium service will connect the city directly with the
eastern and northeastern regions for thousands of people, especially
college students from Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Assam with
dynamic fares.
The Bengaluru-Patna train (#22353/22354) will run
every Sunday from Cantonment station in the city centre at 3:30pm,
while the Bengaluru-Kamakhya express (# 22503/22504) will start from
Cantonment every Friday at 10:15am and the Bengaluru-Tatanagar train
(#18111/18112) will depart from Yesvantpur every Sunday at 10am.
Prabhu also laid the foundation stone for a foot overbridge at the city's main station.
Union
Ministers M. Venkaiah Naidu, Sadananda Gowda, Ananth Kumar,
parliamentary and state assembly lawmakers and local body corporators
from across the city were present on the occasion.