Railways chalk out plans to avoid cattle hits on newly launched Bhopal-New Delhi Vande Bharat Express route

A race against time has begun to keep cows at bay from the path of the new Vande Bharat Express inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday. The train runs between Bhopal’s Rani Kamalapati station and New Delhi’s Hazrat Nizamuddin station.

The Ahmedabad-Mumbai Vande Bharat Express earned notoriety last year after it hit cattle on its track multiple times and ran over a person. The marquee trainset’s aerodynamic “nose” fell off a few times, pictures of which went viral on social media and earned the railways some notoriety online.

“We are aware of the vulnerable points on the route of the Vande Bharat. We have initiated a multi-disciplinary strategy involving all departments to address this,” said a spokesperson of the North Central Railway.

The general manager of North Central Railway held a meeting a few days ago and chalked out a strategy against cattle hits.
Locations between Agra and Palwal where fencing gaps exist have been identified. The spokesperson said the repair work would be completed soon. Some of these locations are between sections such as Kitham-Farah, Agra-Bhandei, and Vrindavan-Bhuteshwar-Ajhai. The section already had some fencing for the Gatiman Express between Delhi and Agra, and later extended to Jhansi.

“Many stretches on the fencing have gaps, or the fence is damaged. We have decided to repair those,” he told The Indian Express.

The pain points are the level crossings from where cattle can stray into the track. And once cattle stray into the track fenced from both sides, there is no way out, and a run-over incident is inevitable, officials said. Given this, it has been decided to deploy staff at the level crossings, for now, to ensure that such incidents do not happen.

The Hazrat Nizamuddin-Rani Kamlapati Vande Bharat Express runs on a route that throws up the highest cattle run-over cases in Uttar Pradesh.

From 2,183 cattle-hit incidents recorded in the country in 2015-16, the number rose to 26,000 in 2021-22. Records showed that the Prayagraj-based North Central Railway alone accounted for 6,500 of those cases.

After successive incidents of Vande Bharat trains hitting cattle on the track last year, Railways ordered fencing of that corridor at key points. It also ordered the fencing of the Ghaziabad-Kanpur section in Uttar Pradesh. Inspired by the National Highways Authority of India, the design of the fencing crash barriers on highways, including those made of oil-coated bamboo.

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The Vande Bharat Express has been given a maximum permissible speed of 160 kmph on this route. Social media was abuzz on Sunday that the train crossed that limit at least once. Railway officials clarified that there is a five per cent margin on the maximum permissible limit, accounting for slopes and such factors. “It would have been for a few seconds,” the spokesperson said.