New Delhi:
Union Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced 54 new trains and 101 new suburban train services in Mumbai, saying more such services will be launched in Kolkata and Chennai.
In her Railway Budget speech 2010, the minister also announced a special train 'Sanskriti Express' to mark the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore will run across the country and also to Bangladesh.
Special tourist trains called 'Bharat Teerth' will be started on 16 routes while six long-distance non-stop Duronto Express trains and four short-distance Duronto day trains will be introduced, Banerjee said.
While ladies special trains would be renamed 'Matribhoomi Specials', three unreserved trains named 'Karambhoomi specials' would be introduced for work-force along with new weekly express service 'Janmabhoomi Express' between Ahmedabad and Udhampur.
New services to be introduced include 54 trains, 28 new passenger services, nine MEMU and eight DEMU services. The routes of 21 trains will be extended and the frequency of 12 trains increased.
Six high-speed passenger train corridors have been identified to be executed through public-private partnership mode and a national high-speed rail authority will be set up for planning, implementing and monitoring these projects.
(With PTI inputs)