Sabarmati to Katra Express Extended to Vaishno Devi, No Change at Jammu Now

Pilgrims from Gujarat heading to Vaishno Devi no longer have to change trains at Jammu. Western Railway has extended the Sabarmati to Jammu Tawi Express all the way to Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Katra, and the first extended trains are running this week.

Train 19223 began its extended run from Sabarmati on Sunday, October 18. It leaves Sabarmati daily at 10:25 in the morning and reaches Katra at 6:55 the next evening, stopping at Jammu Tawi at 3:35 in the afternoon on the way. The return train, 19224, starts from Katra on Tuesday, October 20, leaving at 4:50 in the morning and arriving at Sabarmati at 2:05 the next afternoon.

The extension adds three new halts in the Jammu region: Samba, Bari Brahmana and Martyr Captain Tushar Mahajan station at Udhampur. Western Railway's chief public relations officer, Vineet Abhishek, issued the schedule details.

The route runs through Bathinda, Firozpur, Jalandhar and Pathankot, which means pilgrims and other travellers from Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana and Punjab get a direct seat to Katra, the base town for the Vaishno Devi shrine, without the change at Jammu that used to break the journey, especially for older passengers and families with luggage.

Northern Railway's Jammu division spokesman Raghvender Singh said the new halts will help local residents, students, traders, industrial workers and military personnel, including workers linked to the Bari Brahmana industrial area. He said the daily service should support religious tourism as well as trade and employment along the route.

The practical gain is time and simplicity. A direct train removes a transfer, a second wait on a platform, and the risk of a missed connection on a journey that many families plan for months. For the Jammu towns gaining halts, it also means a daily long distance train to Gujarat that did not exist before this week.

Passengers on this route should still check the revised timings before travelling. Railway officials said the extension has led to timing changes for about two dozen trains passing through the Jammu division, and the final schedules sit with the railways' official enquiry channels.

Both services run daily in both directions, which matters for a pilgrimage route where demand does not follow a weekend pattern. A daily direct train also spreads the load that used to bunch onto the Jammu connection, and gives families a single booking to plan around instead of two separate journeys stitched together at a crowded junction.