R.V. Raveendran, J. - (1.) Leave granted.
(2.) The Respondent, a practicing lawyer, filed a public interest litigation in the year 2009 in the Madhya Pradesh High Court (Gwalior Bench) praying for issue of the following directions to the Railway administration (Western Railway, West Central Railway and North Central Railway): (i) the additional berths from Three Tier Sleeper & AC Class Coaches in all trains; (ii) to complete the second track between Gwalior and Indore; and submit a progress report to court in respect of the work done in the last 25 years; (iii) to reschedule the train timings of Bhind - Indore Intercity Express (Train No. 9319/9320) and Gwalior-Indore Express (Train No. 1125/1126) taking into account various factors and not to stop the train at Parihar and Laxmibai Nagar; (iv) to fill all vacant posts of coolies in all stations to avoid discomfort to passengers; (v) to introduce additional 3 tier sleeper coaches in all trains between Gwalior and Indore; (vi) to introduce additional coaches (AC-I & AC-III) in Dehradun Express, additional coaches (AC I and AC-II tier) in Bhind-Indore Intercity Express and Gwalior-Indore Expresses (Train No. 9319, 9320, 1125 & 1126); (vii) to extend train route of Ujjain-Dehradun Express (Train No. 4309 and 4310) upto Indore; (viii) to re-schedule the timings of Intercity Express and Dehradun Express to enable more passengers can use them and; (ix) to extend the route of Shuttle Express (Gwalior-Guna-Gwalior) and Indore-Maksi-Indore upto Indore and Gwalior respectively during day time.
(3.) The High Court passed a series of interim orders in the said case, in compliance of which, Railways made changes in the timings of several trains. They also added AC-II coaches, AC-I coaches, composite (AC-III cum AC-II) coaches to several trains. In some cases, the Railway Administration informed the court that the demand for further trains/coaches will not be feasible or could not be met, either due to technical reasons or lack of full capacity utilization in regard to existing trains/coaches. They also pointed out that certain seasonal increase in passenger traffic like summer vacations, cannot be a ground for permanent or throughout the year addition of new trains or addition of new coaches.;