For the timely transportation of vegetables, fruits, dairy products, etc., to consumers, Piyush Goyal-led Indian Railways is introducing another Kisan Rail train service. Indian Railways has flagged off India’s second and South India’s first Kisan Rail train service, from Anantapur in the state of Andhra Pradesh to Adarsh Nagar in Delhi. The inaugural run of the train started on 9 September 2020. Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar and Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy jointly flagged off the Kisan Rail train via video conferencing.
The first Kisan Rail train service on the Indian Railways network was launched on 7 August 2020. The train runs between Devlali in Maharashtra and Danapur in the state of Bihar. The Kisan Rail consists of 10 parcel vans as well as one luggage cum brake van and operates on a weekly basis.
The first-ever multi-commodity train service, the Kisan Rail carries vegetables such as cauliflower, capsicum, cabbage, drumsticks, chillies, onion, etc., as well as fruits like grapes, pomegranate, banana, etc. Equipped with frozen containers, the Kisan Rail train service is building a seamless national cold supply chain of meat, milk, and fish.
The Devlali – Danapur Kisan Rail has scheduled halts at Nasik Road, Jalgaon, Manmad, Khandwa, Satna, Bhusaval, Katni, Itarsi, Manikpur, Jabalpur, Buxar, Burhanpur, Prayagraj Chheoki, and Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay Nagar. Indian Railways believes that the Kisan Rail train service will cater to the needs of small farmers or traders by carrying their perishable items to distant places.
The move is a step towards achieving the goal of doubling the incomes of farmers by 2022, according to the Railway Ministry. Earlier, the ministry had stated that the freight of this train will be charged as per the parcel tariff of Indian Railways’ normal train (P Scale).