Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu on Friday handed over to the Regional Rail Museum in Howrah the first alternating current locomotive that joined Eastern Railway (ER) way back in 1960.Among the first AC electric locomotives used in India, the WAM had hauled several high profile trains on the Eastern Railway including the likes of Kalka Mail which recently completed 150 years of its existence. Introduced in 1960, the locomotive clocked over 38 lakh km till its last run in October 1997 when it was retired.
Besides handing over the restored locomotive to the museum, Prabhu flagged off two trains, announced five new train services and launched an app for paperless ticketing here at the Howrah Station.The minister who is here to attend the Bengal Global Business Summit flagged off the Panskura-Digha EMU Local and the Howrah-Pune Weekly Suvidha AC Express.He also announced five new train services of the South Eastern Railway (SER) - the Howrah-Lokmanya Tilak Terminus Suvidha AC Express, the Shalimar-Chennai Suvidha AC Express, Satragachi-Amta local, Kharagpur-Santragachi and the Rupsa-Bhanjpur.He also extended four EMU/DEMU services of the SER.The minister launched an app enabling passengers to book tickets through it without the hassle of waiting in a queue.