High Speed Trains In India

When we do a comparative analysis of high speed trains running around the world with the ones running in India , we arrive at the below charts which in itself will explain the state of Railways in India in terms of high speed.

Japan boasts of the fastest train in the world with a record speed of 603 kmph achieved by JR Central’s L0 superconducting Maglev on 21 April 2015. The next in the line is TGV from France with a record speed of 574.8 kmph achieved on 3rd April 2007. As in other fields China figures in top three here also, with the Shanghai Maglev achieving a record speed of 501 kmph in tests. South Korea, a country much smaller in size than India, appears next in the list, with a record speed of 421.4 kmph achieved on 2013 by HEMU-430X. Taiwan too appears in the list with a record speed of 300 kmph, which is based on Japan’s Shinkansen technology. Uzbekistan appears slightly down in the order with a record speed of 255 kmph achieved by Uzbekistan Railways running on Talgo 250. Sadly, India appears at the bottom of the list.

As of now, India does not have a high speed train with operational speed in excess of 200 kmph neither do we have something which has a top speed near to 200. The fastest train on the network is Gatimaan Express with maximum speed of 160 kmph and a much lower operating speed of 113 kmph.

With the world moving towards MAGLEV i.e. magnetic levitation with max speed in excess of 600 kmph and doing experimentation on Vactrain i.e. MAGLEV lines using partly evacuated tunnels that may reach a speed up to 1000 kmph, clearly the Indian Railways has a lot of homework to do and a lot of milestones to achieve to make itself recognized the world over.

Data Source:
http://www.goeuro.com/trains/high-speed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Railways
http://www.railway-technology.com/