The National Capital Region Transport Corporation (NCRTC) has successfully completed the first full-length trial run of the Namo Bharat train between Delhi’s Sarai Kale Khan and Modipuram in Meerut, covering the entire 82 km corridor in under an hour.
The high-speed trains, part of India’s first semi-high-speed regional rail corridor, reached speeds of up to 160 km/h during the trial. The Namo Bharat trains halted at every station en route and met NCRTC’s targeted journey time, marking a major step toward the corridor’s full commissioning.
Running alongside the Meerut Metro trains during the trial, the Namo Bharat system passed all operational checks. This includes successful integration with ETCS Level 3 hybrid signalling system — the world’s first deployment of such technology over an LTE backbone, integrated with platform screen doors (PSDs) at every station.
Currently, 55 km of the corridor with 11 stations is open to the public. Trial runs and finishing work are underway on the remaining stretches — a 4.5 km segment between Sarai Kale Khan and New Ashok Nagar in Delhi, and a 23 km stretch between Meerut South and Modipuram, which includes the Meerut Metro section.
The Meerut Metro segment consists of 13 stations, with 18 km elevated and 5 km underground. This marks the first instance in India where local metro services will operate on shared infrastructure with a high-speed regional train system.
The successful trial run represents a significant achievement for NCRTC and brings India closer to launching its first rapid regional transit network connecting Delhi, Ghaziabad, and Meerut.
