Kota: A fire erupted inside an air-conditioned coach of the Thiruvananthapuram-Hazrat Nizamuddin Rajdhani Express in the Ratlam district of Madhya Pradesh early Sunday morning, according to railway officials.
No casualties or injuries were reported in connection with the blaze, which began at approximately 5:15 a.m. within the Kota railway division.
The fire originated in the B-1 coach, which was accommodating 68 travellers at the time, necessitating immediate emergency protocols, Senior Railway Commercial Manager Sourabh Jain said. In response to the emergency, technicians detached the compromised coach from the rest of the train assembly and promptly deactivated the overhead electrical supply line to safeguard the area.
All passengers were successfully evacuated from the train. Ravinder Lakhara, the public relations officer for the Kota railway division, confirmed to Press Trust of India that no travellers suffered injuries during the incident. A significant number of passengers from Kerala, including several Malayalis, were reported to be on board the service.
Railway authorities announced that interim arrangements were established to distribute the displaced passengers across the remaining coaches for their transit to Kota. Officials added that a replacement coach would be integrated into the train configuration at the Kota station to restore the vehicle's standard passenger capacity.
The exact cause of the fire remains under investigation.