146 Years of Glorious Service:: Undisputed Kalka Mail keeps going and going and going...
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More than 3 hours and 30 minutes late running 12312 Kalka (KLK)- Howrah (HWH) Down KALKA Superfast Mail headed by its regular link 30247 Duronto liveried GZB shed WAP-7 thunders through the Reverse line at Baruipara station on HB Chord enroute. The late running was due to the...
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infamous North Indian fog mayhem. At the background, you can also find a stationary 12337 Howrah (HWH)- Bolpur (BHP) SHANTINIKETAN Superfast Express, which was waiting to get signal to change tracks from the Up Main to the Reverse after the Kalka Mail had passed through the Reverse..
Come 2012, and 12311/ 12312 Kalka Mail completed 146 years of glorious service. It began operation in 1866 between Calcutta and Delhi with numbering 1 Up/ 2 Down EAST INDIAN RAILWAY MAIL. It was further extended from Delhi to Kalka in 1891. The train was the principal mechanism for British civil servants to move from the capital, Calcutta, to the summer capital in Shimla. As the capital used to be shifted twice every year, the entire government machinery used to travel on Kalka Mail. Both the stations had internal carriageway for the cars of Viceroy and other high ranking officers to reach next to their Rail Coach, The carriageway at Howrah is still used and runs between Platforms 8 and 9, but the carriageway at Kalka has been converted into platform.
There is two unique kind of info related to this train:
1) This train runs as a normal Express (Super Crawler) between Old Delhi and Chandigarh (with 12 halts in 267 kms), and as a Superfast between Howrah and Old Delhi (with 27 halts in 1446 kms). Ticket prices are calculated like-wise.
2) This is the only train in India to have the pantry car attached for half of the journey. Neither the terminating nor the originating station sees this train with a Pantry Car. The Pantry Car gets attached at Chandigarh (with 10 other coaches) and gets detached at Mughal Sarai, where a sectional A.C. 3 Tier coach (seen just after the loco) replacing the Pantry.