Vande Bharat Trains Hit High Occupancy Rates Across Routes in Financial Year 2026

Train Occupancy Numbers

Vande Bharat Chair Car trains recorded an overall passenger occupancy of 99.10 per cent during the 2025-26 financial year, according to a senior Railway Board official. The country's first Vande Bharat Sleeper service, which launched between Howrah and Kamakhya, registered a consolidated occupancy of 114.54 per cent in the same period.

Top Performing Routes

The service running between Thiruvananthapuram Central and Mangaluru Central recorded the highest passenger occupancy across all Vande Bharat routes at 189.35 per cent. Specifically, train number 20632 from Thiruvananthapuram Central to Mangaluru Central reached 189.35 per cent occupancy, while its return service, train number 20631 from Mangaluru Central to Thiruvananthapuram Central, recorded 174.77 per cent. Meanwhile, on the Delhi-Varanasi route, chair car train numbers 22415 and 22435 running from Varanasi to New Delhi recorded 117.26 per cent and 117.25 per cent occupancy respectively.

New Service Announcements

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced a second Vande Bharat Sleeper train for Bengaluru during the launch of the country's third Vande Bharat Sleeper service on the Bengaluru-Mumbai route. This upcoming train will operate via Hubballi and connect Bengaluru with Pune and Mumbai.

Context

High passenger numbers above one hundred per cent on train routes typically happen due to ticket pooling, short-distance ticket sales, and passengers boarding and deboarding at intermediate stations along the journey. The Ministry of Railways introduced these semi-high-speed trains in 2019, and over 160 services now operate nationwide with coaches manufactured by the Integral Coach Factory in Chennai.