Rajdhani Express, India’s one of the luxurious train, start fromNational Capital to state capitals like Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore,Kolkatta, Trivendaram, Guwathi etc. There are many *road* trips onghumakkar, and missing one on specific train, and a long trip likeBAngalore - Delhi. So, I thought of writing on Rajdhani Express, I donot have any picture for this trip.
Recently, we went to Ghaziabad from Bangalore, air tickets pricesare high now days and I have to buy 4 tickets, so we thought of takingtrip by Rajdhani Express. Train is cheaper, bought 2 full tickets, 1half ticket for my son and daughter traveling free. Train fare is2800/- for IIAC, which is quite good and you pay 1500/- for the kidsabove 5 till 12 years of age. I booked the ticket for my mother whilecoming back, and this is again @ 50% off (30% senior citizen and + 20%off old age women), jai ho “Bhartiya Rail”.

Rajdhani Express starts from Bangalore @ 8:20 PM and reaches Delhi 3rdday @ 6:00 AM. From Delhi, it starts @ 8:50 PM and reaches 3rd day 6:35in the morning. It’s good, you can work for the whole day and catch upthe train in the evening, relax for another day in the train andfollowing morning you will reach Delhi. As soon as train starts itsjourney, water bottles gets served, after few minutes, you are servedwith tomato soup with soup sticks and Amul butter (I have not seen soupsticks since long). As soon as you are done with your soup, attendantasks your choice for the dinner, veg / non-veg. Serve nice food around10:00 PM followed by desert like ice-cream. While you are having yourdinner, another attendant gets your bedding, pillows, 2 bed sheets anda blanket. You can ask more if you want, they are happy to provide thesame if they have in stock. After a nice dinner, it’s sleep time now.
Wife and kids are always happy traveling in train. Wife is happy tosave some money and husband is their for next 34 hours without any workand to take care of kids. Kids are happy as they get lots of space toplay, mother and father with them for next 34 hours without any work.My son use to carry his own bag which contains toys and board games tokeep all of us busy. While coming back, we actually worked on mydaughters Doll house. They love to go up and down from lower to upperberth and upper to lower berth. My daughter learned climbing up all byherself this time. My kids are lucky that they always find someone elseas well to play with them in the train, while going they found 1bachelor guy and while coming back they found couple of other kids. Ourcabin becomes kid’s room for next 2 days.
Morning tea is served around 6:00 AM, before you reach Hyderabad.Hyderabad is the 1st main stoppage while traveling from Bangalore, itreaches Hyderabad around 7:00 in the morning and stops for about 20minutes. Rajdhani is good for the travelers to and from Hyderabad aswell, we did this during our visit to Hyderabad in August (yes NDM, Ihave to write about Hyderabad trip as well).
Around 9:00 AM, you are served with breakfast and news paper, Ithink they took breakfast from Hyderabad. You enjoy your breakfast andnews paper and kids are ready for Hangama in the train. Next station isBalarshah in Maharastra sometime 1:00 PM and during your lunch hour.Next is Nagpur around 4:30 PM during your evening tea. There are lotsof vendors on the platform selling Nagpur Oranges, I suggest not buyingthose as they are not the best oranges they would be selling there.After about an hour leaving from Nagpur, you are served with eveningsnacks along with Jumpin juice. Bhopal-MP is the next stop, by thattime your are already done with your dinner. Nagpur soup and dinnerwere little different and you will like it. You cross Jhansi-UPsomewhere around 1:00 AM, you pass through Chambal/Gwalior (ReadNandan’s Khajurao story for detail about chambal). Train also passesAgra and Mathura, but do not stop there and the last stop is New Delhi- Nizammuddin Railway Station.
We were suppose to reach Delhi @ 6:00 AM, but due to the Mumbaiterror strike (8-29th Nov), all trains from there were running late,hence, Rajdhani was also running late. Around 6:00 AM I thought we musthave reach Delhi, but I saw Agra Cant platform board. We reached Delhifor about 4 hours late. No complain, as attendant served us the tea,normally they don’t serve it on the last morning of the journey.
Rajdhani express is full A/C and 3 classes, 3 tier sleeper, 2 tiersleeper and Ist AC, no chair car and general. For people traveling withkids, I think II AC is a good choice as you get lot of space, everycabin of 4 has curtains for your privacy. Some people are so private,that you see them only while boarding or getting off, otherwise theyare always hidden behind the curtain. To get the food, they are so shythat, they take out a hand on attendant call and take out the same handwhile giving back the empty plates.
All food is on the house, lunch and dinner have dal, roti,paneer/chicken, curd, salad, rice and desert. Morning tee also getserved with biscuits and candies, evening snacks have smaosa/cutlets,sweet, breakfast has cutlets/omlette, vegetable sandwich. For verysmall kids, it’s better to carry your milk, as they do not have milkother then powder milk.
All the Rajdhani express are now sponsored by AirTel or New YorkLife insurance, and they have their cleaners on board along with thefeed back form. Bathrooms are somewhat clean, you can find soapdispensers, perfume dispenser, toilet seat covers (first time I sawthem in India and that too in Rajdhani). Train coaches also haveperfume dispensers, light on board music, coaches gets cleaned severaltime, but still you can find cockroches and mouse (good for kids forfun or to keep them quite).
I heard that Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani is vey nice, it has all newimported coaches. I also heard that Bangalore Rajdhani also have Wi-Fi,but there is none, may be coming on your way soon. You can findelectrical points to charge up your cell phone or laptop, but most ofthem are 2 pins, so carry a converter if you have 3 pin plug. There arestill lots of scope for improvement, but I hope they will come soon.You will miss TV, as I was missing a lot, I wanted to get theinformation about Mumbai tragedy, but your cell phone works most of thetime.
“Bhartiya Rail, sadev aapke liye”

Frequently travelled class on this train:

Second class