After inordinate delay and cost escalation, the Bengaluru Metro on Wednesday got three additional coaches from the state-run Bharat Earth Movers Limited (BEML) for its east-west corridor service, with one coach reserved for women.
"The three additional coaches will be added to an existing three-coach metro train, allowing more number of passengers to travel by the metro," the Chairman and Managing Director of BEML Deepak Kumar Hota told reporters.
The three additional coaches will be added to a metro train on the purple line that runs between Baiyappanahalli and Mysore Road.
The first coach of the new six-coach metro train is to be reserved for women and children.
The additional coaches will help in decongesting the city roads, Hota stated.
"After integrating and rigorous testing, passengers can travel by the six-coach metro by the end of April or early May," the Managing Director of the state-run Bengaluru Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL) Mahendra Jain said.
Currently, at least four lakh people use the Bengaluru metro each day for commute on its north-south (green) and east-west (purple) lines.
The metro service, which opened to the public in June 2017, has not eased the traffic congestion on the city's arterial roads as it covers a mere 42 km of the 800 km city, with ever-expanding suburbs.
The BEML was given a contract in March 2017 to convert all the Bengaluru Metro's three-coach trains to six-coach units.
"By June 2019 all the 50 metro trains running on the two metro lines will have six coaches instead of three," Jain asserted.
With the addition of three coaches to each of the metro trains, the number of passengers to ride the metro each day is expected to double to about eight lakh.