 "India develops indigenous bullet train, targets over 250 km/h speeds")
India has begun the development of an indigenous bullet train expected to exceed speeds of 250 kilometres per hour (km/h), reported The Economic Times (ET), citing a senior government official.
The official stated that this train would surpass the speed of any current trains within the Indian Railways network. "It is constructed on the Vande Bharat platform, which currently reaches a maximum speed of 220 kilometres per hour," he said.
The design process is currently in progress at the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai, under the supervision of Indian Railways.
Globally, high-speed trains are those operating at speeds over 250 kilometres per hour, such as the French Train à Grande Vitesse and the Japanese Shinkansen.
India is using Japanese technology for the bullet trains planned for the Ahmedabad to Mumbai route. These trains, part of the Shinkansen E5 series, have a top speed of 320 km/h.
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According to the official, the focus has been on increasing the speed of Indian Railways trains. "The [proposed] variant Vande Bharat trains can now accelerate from zero to 100 km/h in 52 seconds while existing bullet trains achieve this in 54 seconds," he informed ET.
The Vande Bharat trains are developed domestically by ICF. These indigenous bullet trains will operate on the recently announced north, south, and east corridors. "The new corridors will be using more Indian technology and domestic manufacturing," the official added.
These developments will complement the existing western corridor, which was established through collaboration with Japan, incorporating their advanced technology. The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)( is extending a soft loan of approximately Rs 40,000 crore for the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail project, with the total project cost exceeding Rs 1.08 trillion.
The National High-Speed Rail Corporation Ltd (NHSRCL), responsible for executing the bullet train project, recently reported the completion of 300 kilometres of pier work. Furthermore, the acquisition of land for the entire 508-kilometre stretch was finalised in January.