Vande Bharat’s appeal goes well beyond speed

Trains running on time have been overtaken by speed as a talking point. When exactly this happened is hard to identify. On a timeline stretching all the way back to steam engines, we can pin the shift on Japan’s Bullet trains. Flagged off in the 1960s, their clever branding gave them instant fame around the world—and other railways a fast-moving target to chase. It was decades later that China zipped ahead with its sudden maglev acceleration. As visitors to Shanghai testify, magnetic-levitation travel is a marvel of technology. Freed from the friction of track contact, a maglev train ride is a smooth glide at a whizzy 400km per hour. By most accounts, it’s a sensation in a class of its own. Its engine does not have a Bullet-like snout, but a sleek aerodynamic front. This is a look sported by the Indian Railways’ Vande Bharat trains as well. While it may be taken as a sign that India has also joined the race for pace, the fact that these move no faster than about 130km per hour should keep expectations capped.

This week saw the launch of five new Vande Bharat Express services, taking the total to 23. The electric locomotive that powers them was locally developed, and since it can operate on our creaky old network of tracks, the plan is to span much of the country with “high-speed” links afforded by it. Although these trains hurtle along swiftly in comparison with the slow coaches that carry most of our railway passengers, they can only move as fast as our ageing rails allow. Unlike China’s maglev, which uses costly magnetic tracks and has ended up as a showpiece, Vande Bharat has the advantage of low-cost scalability. This means it could eventually save a lot more passenger travel hours. Technically, it represents only a modest advancement over what we had earlier. In a key sense, it’s what the auto industry calls a ‘re-skin’ job—a spiffy new exterior, that is, to mask much the same under the hood. As it boasts of slightly better traction and speed than other Indian trains, it qualifies as an upgrade. But it doesn’t rid the ride of shudders and jerks. Among its most notable features is its use of ‘regenerative braking’, by which the energy generated in this process is captured for re-use. As for cabin comfort, with on-board wi-fi and accessible plug-in points for devices, Vande Bharat offers just about the minimum that a traveller would expect, even if that’s a lot more than what the country’s railway users have been accustomed to. All taken into account, spruced up railway services mark a welcome break from the past. But had it not been for a markedly more contemporary facade, little else about Vande Bharat would impress anyone who has taken trains in well-off countries.

Given the constraints of our railway infrastructure, incremental improvement is perhaps the best we can hope for. As land-acquisition delays in the Ahmedabad-Mumbai Bullet train project indicate, a speed-up of the sort that could rival what took place in China—where one can reach a city like Hangzhou at 300km per hour on a non-maglev train—is likely to be fraught with complications. Still, modernizing what we have is a worthy enterprise for the vast number of people it can serve, even impress. If wowing multitudes of people who haven’t had a better experience is a priority, then it’s on the right track with Vande Bharat. The very imagery it generates works in favour of the government. Making trains run on time isn’t novel. This makeover is.