There are 2 ways by which you can transport a bike in trains
1) Luggage (if you travel in the same train with your bike on a confirmed ticket)
2) Parcel (if you don't travel in the same train)
Some stations don't allow/have Parcel services,(e.g. Nizamuddin station) learnt it the hard way so do check that before anything.
Apart from having a luggage van ,always try to use a train which starts and terminates at the places you board and get down. This gives enough time for safe offloading of your bike.
(for e.g. Sampark kranti for BLR-DEL)
Else at-least confirm that the train stops at the station for a good amount of time for your bike to be offloaded.
If you ask me, the safest way to transport your bike is as luggage, where you see how it was loaded ,ensure that the bike is traveling along with you and how its unloaded.
There are a lot of people who are ready to pack your bike outside the railway carriage area with thick cartoons and jute bags. You can either bargain with them or get it bubble wrapped by yourself . Pointers are you can go to any bike godown and collect lot of waste materials from which their bikes were transported.
Documentation is generally pretty simple , like photo copies of DL,registration,PUC etc and a luggage/parcel form which also includes travel insurance available at all stations. Porters may ask for some extra (bribe) ...
Front what I have seen, in most cases of railway transportation, front fairing and front/rear indicators take the most of beating, so see if you can either pack it very well or take them separately, you might save yourself some heart ache and money.
I have used trains twice ,once GATI and twice Local packers and movers along with my other house-hold articles on BLR-KOL-BLR & BLR-DEL-BLR route and would ask you to avoid GATI . They cheat you in multiple fronts ,are expensive and inferior to railways.
And also they transport through roads which has its own demerits like jerking,humps,accident,local-police asking bribe etc. and generally takes more time.
Trains are efficient in that matter if the frequency is good.
I am in no way advertising Indian railway,(have no relationship) but saying I had an ok experience if you know things and make some effort.
Also I have seen people asking for transportation for small distances like CHN-BLR or PUN-BLR, in these cases the best way is to ride down.
Believe me it saves a lot of headache,money and going around.
My 2 cents...


. Also, I will be there for at-least 2-years.
(first timer :P )

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