Stones Thrown At Vande Bharat, Windows Broken Days Before Flagging Off

Five people have been arrested for allegedly throwing stones at the Vande Bharat Express train during its trial run in Chhattisgarh, officials said today. The train, scheduled to run from Chhattisgarh’s Durg to Andhra Pradesh’s Visakhapatnam, was set to be flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday.

The stones were pelted on the Vande Bharat train at the Bagbahara railway station while it was returning from Visakhapatnam Friday morning, officials said.

No injuries were reported but the multi-layered windows of three coaches of the train were damaged.

The accused, identified as Shiv Kumar Baghel, Devendra Kumar, Jeetu Pandey, Sonwani, and Arjun Yadav, broke the windows of three coaches of the train, C2-10, C4-1, C9-78, officials said.

A case has been filed against the accused — residents of Bagbahara — under the Railways Act, 1989.

Besides Durg to Visakhapatnam Vande Bharat train, PM Modi is scheduled to flag off India’s first Vande Metro from Gujarat’s Bhuj to Ahmedabad and the first 20-coach Vande Bharat train from Varanasi to Delhi on Monday.

He will also launch Vande Bharat trains on the following routes – Tatanagar to Patna, Nagpur to Secunderabad, Kolhapur to Pune, Agra Cantt to Banaras, and Pune to Hubballi