Title - New Vizag-Mumbai train flagged off

A new weekly superfast train connecting the city to Mumbai on the West Coast, traversing backward regions of Orissa and Chhattisgarh, was flagged off here by Union Minister of State for HRD D. Purandeswari on Sunday.She thanked the Railway Minister and officials for the new Visakhapatnam - Lokmanya Tilak Terminus Express and termed it a boon for devotees heading to Shirdi.She said it was unfortunate the special train to Shirdi was not converted into a regular service and it had become routine for it to be discontinued due to a communication gap between East Coast Railway (ECoR) and South Central Railway.She said she would take up the issue with the Railway Minister to increase allocation of passenger amenity fund to the ECoR.

Train schedule
The new train would run on Sundays from Visakhapatnam and Tuesdays from Mumbai. It covers 1,650 km in about 29 hours, touching Vizianagaram, Rayagada, Titlagarh, Raipur, Durg, Nagpur, Bhusawal and Manmad.Government Whip Dronamraju Srinivas Rao, MLAs T. Vijay Kumar, M. Vijay Prasad and Ch. Venkataramaiah, Divisional Railway Manager Kashinath and others were also present.