Yes, this is true. As per the officials, it has been determined that very soon all trains running in India will be equipped with 22 coaches, making each one of them suitable and apt for running on any of the route. This is applicable on each of the train irrespective of the total time taken and distance covered by each one of them to complete the travel and rail excursion. The honourable Railway Minister in New Delhi Piyush Goyal stated that Indian Railways is been planning to devise a kind of standardisation in all trains in terms of number of coaches so that every one of them could run on all the routes without any hindrance.
He added, that all trains will have 22 coaches making them good enough to run on any route. To do the same, necessary actions will be taken care by with time. Like, in order to have 22 coaches, the length of the platforms need to be increased and many other changes that need to be carried out will be taken further into consideration. As per Mr. Piyush Goyal, he told reporters further that the respective engineering department will look further into this matter soon. At present, coaches defined and available are of two kinds including LHB and ICF. And the total number of coaches in any of the train are like in numbers of 12, 16, 18, 22 or 26, all depending on the demand and rush, making it often difficult and troublesome for the Indian Railways to substitute one with the other, specifically in case of a delay.
Adding to this, a senior railway official explained that if the number of coaches in all trains would be the same than it would be easier to press any train to move and head, which is ready and need to arrive at any of the station and if one is been undergoing maintenance or under operation, rather than just waiting for the same train to get ready and move from one destination to other. He also stated that Indian Railways had analyzed about more than 300 groups of trains along with their routes in the first level of phase. And the changes in the total number of trains running on a specific route along with their timings reflecting in the new time table, is going to be published in the coming month of July.
The benefit of acquiring and having the same composition of standard trains, just for an example the sleeper, general and air conditioned coaches is the one that they can run and head on any of the defined route. Also, in the first phase, as per them they have segregated more than 300 groups of trains as well as identified routes on which they can operate and run and that is mostly covering mainline and busy routes. He also further added that for a successful execution of the plan, Indian Railways will have to standardize its overall infrastructure, filling, length of the platforms and washing lines and more.