Travelling on Mumbai locals is an daunting task. Lakhs of passengers commute on these local trains, on a daily basis for their bread and butter. Now in a historic shift, the Ministry of Railways has provided the approval for upgrading the locals by launching Vande metro trains in the city.
The decision to upgrade the local trains in the city and procurement of these metro trains was approved on 19 May 2023. A total of 238 Vande metro trains will be running in Mumbai soon. The procurement of these new metro trains is coming under the Mumbai Urban Transport Project-III (MUTP-III) and 3A (MUTP-3A), according to a report by Republic World. The Railway Ministry and the Maharashtra government are looking over this project.
The development project of the manufacturing process will be taken care of by the technology partner. They will work on the upgraded trains in their factories themselves. The most important point to note here is that the development process will be following all the Make in India guidelines. The Republic World report also states how a spokesperson of Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation shared that MRVC will be taking up the procurement of these trains. The idea for the AC local train was first mooted in 2002, to combat deaths caused by overcrowded trains. According to an RTI query by the Government Railway Police, between 2005 and 2015, "25,722 passengers fell from suburban trains [travelling on Western, Central and Harbour suburban services in Mumbai Commissionerate], of whom 6,989 commuters died while 18,733 survived". Last year, 700 died after reportedly falling off running trains.