Unless there is drastic reduction in journey times as compared to Rajdhani/ Shatabdi trains, people are not going to pay significant premium for cosmetic changes or little more facilities. Tejas/ Humsafar/ UDAY etc are the ventures that are aimed for generating additional profits where as Antyoday trains will further bleed the IRlys due to higher cost than already over-subsidised general coaches.
Tejas/ Humsafar/ UDAY etc are the ventures that are aimed for generating additional profits where as Antyoday trains will further bleed the IRlys much more than ordinary coach jansadharan trains due to higher cost than already over-subsidised general coaches.
Unless...
more... there is drastic reduction in journey times as compared to Rajdhani/ Shatabdi trains, people are not going to pay appreciable premium for cosmetic changes or little more facilities. Poor occupancy of Gatiman is a recent example.
What significant facility Tejas can provide over the Gatiman is difficult to imagine. Tejas appears to be a rebranded shatabdi with some cosmetic addons and same speed 130kmph (and journey time). Why people will pay much higher is difficult to believe.
Garib rath was downward extrapolation (of fares) of Rajdhani ACIII class, where as Humsafar shall be upward extrapolation. Speed potential of all the 3 is same, so shall be journey times.
UDAY is just like acDD chair car trains which are not so successful even during day journey, its success during night journey is any body’s guess. Not a single DD runs with full length 24ICF or 21/22 LHB coaches.
Unless IRlys really go SHS i.e. 200kmph and drastically reduce the journey times, the concept of premium trains cannot work through Indian network. Only opportunity is on tourist destinations esp. involving foreign touristswho will be ready to pay extra for such cosmetic facilities ,which are they accustomed of. Tejas doing Mum-Ahm, NDLS CNB/LKO/ASR in 3-4 hours with higher fares will be a success rather than the current one with cosmetic changes only. Similarly Humsafar doing NDLS-BCT/HWH in 10 hrs.
The better option to earn more revenue is to charge for actual facilities with justification by creating appropriate classes of coaches/trains instead of continue plethora of trains like rajdhani, duronto, shatabdi, GR, Yuva, SK, Jan Shatabdi, Rajya Rani, Jansadharan, AC express, ac DD express etc in addition to standard S/F, M/E, Passenger.