Patna: In a pleasing development for the railway passengers of Bihar, Jharkhand and Bengal, the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat train will start operations on 24th of September, officials said. According to the officials, Vande Bharat will be flagged off in Patna on Sept 24 at around 12.30 pm and will chug from Patna to Howrah.
This will provide a lot of convenience to the passengers of Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. It can be recalled that the trial runs of the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat were carried out only last month. The first trial run of the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat train was conducted on Aug 5 and the second on Aug 12.
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A spokesman for the East Central Railways had said at the time that the trial run on the Patna-Howrah railway line, a distance of 535 km was completed in about 6 hours 30 minutes. Pertinently, the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat train will be the second train for Bihar after the Patna-Ranchi Vande Bharat train, which was operationalised on June 27 this year.
The time schedule and fare of the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat train have not been officially announced yet even as a proposal in this regard has been sent to the Railway Board for final approval. It is learnt that the Patna-Howrah Vande Bharat is likely to be the fastest direct rail connectivity between Patna and Kolkata.
Pertinently, earlier this month, the Patna-Ranchi Vande Bharat Express had a narrow escaped from an accident when a bovine was trapped in the engine wheel at Kuju station in Ramgarh of Jharkhand's Dhanbad Railway Division. While the cattle died on the spot, no passenger was hurt in the mishap.
