Bullet trains: Indian Railways does a first, provides big relief for women

In a first for the Indian Railways, the government has planned separate toilets for men and women for its proposed bullet train, according to a design finalised by the National High Speed Rail Corporation (NHSRC).

Currently, passengers share four toilets per coach, irrespective of their genders. Now, there will be a men's urinal and a women's toilet along with a wheelchair accessible toilet.

In another first, the trains will also have a dedicated room for changing and child feeding, comprising of baby toilet seats, tables for diaper disposal and a low sink for them to wash their hands, according to the design document. 

It said along with special facilities for sick persons on board, the train will also have freezer, hot case, facility to boil water and a tea and coffee maker. 

Coaches will have LCD screens to display train movement details.

Each train will have 55 seats for business class and 695 seats for standard class. There will be luggage space for passengers and all the seats will have adjustable headrests, the document stated.

When a seat is reclined, a seat sliding mechanism will operate in tandem. The seats will have flip-up type armrests (middle ones), it said.

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The train will also have a multi-purpose room with a folding bed, baggage rack, mirror, especially for sick persons and nursing mothers, the document stated. 

The bullet train, which is scheduled to run from 2023, will take about two hours and seven minutes to travel the 508-km distance between Mumbai and Ahmedabad. The NHSRC is implementing the project.