New Delhi, Jul 19 (IANS): In a bid to enhance the travel experience of passengers, the Indian Railways on Monday said that it will start operating the Rajdhani Express trains with feature-loaded, upgraded Tejas smart coaches.
Railway Ministry spokesperson D.J. Narain said that a new era of train travel experience with enhanced comfort is being rolled out in Indian Railways with the introduction of newly-upgraded Tejas sleeper coach rakes in the Western Railways.
He said that these bright golden-hued coaches, with enhanced smart features, are being introduced to run the prestigious Mumbai Rajdhani Express train to offer the best in class travel experience.
He said that the new rake made its maiden run from Monday.
Narain said: "The existing rakes of Mumbai-New Delhi Rajdhani Special Express, one of the most prestigious and premium trains of Western Railway, have been replaced with brand new Tejas-type sleeper coaches. Two such Tejas type sleeper coach rakes have been made ready to run as Rajdhani Express."
He said that out of these two rakes, one rake comprises "exclusive Tejas Smart sleeper coaches", which is first of its kind to be introduced over the Indian Railways.
Highlighting the features of the new smart coaches, Narain said that they have special smart features for enhanced passenger safety and comfort.
"The smart coach aims to provide world-class facilities to passengers with the help of intelligent sensor-based systems," he said, adding that it is equipped with the Passenger Information and Coach Computing Unit (PICCU) provided with GSM network connectivity, which reports to the remote server.
"PICCU will record the data of WSP, CCTV recording, toilet odour sensors, panic switch, and other items integrated with fire detection and alarm system, air quality and choke filter sensor and energy meter," Narain said.
He pointed out that with the use of Tejas smart coach, railways aims to move to predictive maintenance instead of preventive maintenance.
"The introduction of this modern Tejas Sleeper type train for long distance journey, is another paradigm shift by Indian Railways for enhancing the travel experience for the passengers," he said.
He also said that for the enhanced safety of passenger, six cameras are fitted in each coach which gives live recording.
"CCTV cameras with day night vision capability, facial recognition even in low-light condition, network Video Recorder are provided," he said.
He also said that the new smart coaches are equipped with automatic plug doors and all the main entrance doors are centralised, controlled by the guard.
"Train will not start until all the doors are closed," he said.
Other features in the new smart coaches include a fire alarm, detection and suppression system, emergency talk back for medical or security emergency, panic button in lavatories, toilet annunciation sensor integration (which will relay dos and don'ts announcement in the lavatories, whenever it is engaged), bio-vacuum toilet system, stainless steel under-frame, air suspension coaches, and so on.