In the coming years, passengers who travel frequently by Indian Railways will be delighted to see a swanky makeover of all Mail/Express trains! The upgradation process of Mail/Express trains has started under Project Utkrisht. The Railway Ministry is now planning to upgrade as many as 640 Utkrisht rakes in the next two years. This would be done at a cost of Rs 400 crore, a senior official said recently. The first upgraded Utkrisht rake, 12311/12312 Howrah-Kalka Mail, rolled out recently. The Utkrisht rake has been developed as a ‘green rake’, consisting of 20 or 22 number of coaches, at the Liluah workshop which falls under Eastern Railways. The cost of upgrade for each rake under Project Utkrisht has been pegged at Rs 60 lakh.
Member Rolling Stock, Railway Board, Rajesh Agarwal recently said that the aim is to revamp 140 rakes by the month of March next year. Following this, the Railway Board has plans to roll out 500 more rakes by March 2020. He further said that the new rakes will provide better facilities to railway passengers, including odourless toilets, LED lighting among many other modern features.
All the coaches of this rake have been provided with energy efficient LED tube lights, panel of LED lights in doorway as well as in the gangway, stickers with ‘Go Green’ messages, provision of dustbins in the toilets, provision of integrated basin-cum-dustbins in air-conditioned coaches. Also, the toilets of all the coaches of this rake have been provided with improved fittings, vinyl wrapping at the doorways of the coaches, night glow stickers as well as Braille signages inside the coaches along with new colour scheme.
The most unique feature of this rake is the provision of a hybrid design of the bio-toilet system, called Swachh Rail Toilet. It has many advantages including less water consumption, no chocking of the system, complete sealing of odour as well as maintenance friendly. Other than these modern features, the rakes have also been provided with a new colour scheme of beige and maroon on the exterior.
