Getting to VCA Jamtha, Chepauk, and Narendra Modi Stadium — Transit Guide — Experiences

Three grounds, three completely different transport situations. VCA Stadium sits about 15km outside Nagpur with no walkable corridor around it, so getting the plan wrong there genuinely costs you part of a session. Chepauk is in the middle of central Chennai. Narendra Modi Stadium is the only ground in this pack with its own dedicated metro station, and on matchday it is the option to use.

The three grounds, in order of difficulty

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Getting to VCA Jamtha — Khapri Metro & Wardha Road

Three real routes into the ground, and which one actually fits your matchday morning.

Nagpur, more than Chennai or Ahmedabad in this pack, is a city where getting the transport plan wrong genuinely costs you part of a session, because Jamtha sits well outside the centre with no dense, walkable transport corridor around it the way an inner-city ground would have. The three routes here aren't interchangeable options with the same tradeoffs. They're suited to three different starting points, airport, railway station, or a stay along the metro line, and picking the wrong one for your actual situation is a common, avoidable way to miss the toss.

Jamtha

Worth knowing

—If your flight lands the morning of a Test, the airport-to-stadium prepaid taxi (~₹300-400, about 10km) is genuinely faster than routing through the railway station side of town, even if your hotel is downtown.
—Auto-rickshaw drivers around Khapri metro station know the Jamtha run well on matchdays — flag one at the station exit rather than trying to pre-book a cab to meet you there.

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Getting to Chepauk — Triplicane & Chennai Beach Station

Walkable from Marina Beach, a 2-minute walk from its own MRTS stop — Chepauk is the easy one.

A lot of India's Test venues sit some distance from where visitors actually stay, Nagpur's Jamtha being the clearest example in this pack. Chepauk is the opposite case, and it changes the whole rhythm of a matchday. Being able to walk from a hotel near Marina Beach, watch a full day's play, and walk back for dinner without factoring in a stadium-adjacent traffic plan is a genuinely different, more relaxed way to follow five days of Test cricket than the alternative.

Chepauk

Worth knowing

—If your hotel is anywhere near the Chepauk MRTS line, take the suburban train over a taxi on matchday — the station is a 2-minute walk from the ground, and it sidesteps the road congestion that builds up around the stadium once a session lets out.
—Staying in Triplicane or near Marina Beach means you can walk to the ground in under 10 minutes — worth prioritizing over a marginally cheaper hotel further out if you want zero matchday transport stress.

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Getting to Motera — SG Highway & Stadium Access

The one ground in this pack with its own metro station — use it, especially on matchday.

Every other ground in this pack requires some kind of transport compromise, Jamtha's distance from central Nagpur, Chepauk's older, denser street grid. Motera is the one stadium in this pack actually built with its own dedicated metro station, engineered from the start to move a genuinely enormous crowd (132,000 seats) in and out efficiently. That's not a small thing at a ground this size, and it's worth taking advantage of rather than defaulting to a cab out of habit.

Motera

Worth knowing

—Take the metro to Motera Stadium station rather than a cab on matchday specifically — vehicles are often stopped 1-1.5km short of the gates for crowd control, a walk the metro largely avoids by dropping you closer to the entrances.
—If you're arriving from the airport, the cab-to-Thaltej-then-metro route (about 20 minutes total) is faster and cheaper than a direct cab all the way to the stadium once matchday traffic is factored in.

Between the cities

Nagpur → Chennai

No direct flight. Connect through Hyderabad, Mumbai, or Delhi, and treat it as a genuine travel day. Nagpur's last possible day (25 Jan) and Chennai's first (29 Jan) are only four days apart, so don't plan to catch Nagpur's last session and be in Chennai for the next morning's toss.

Nagpur → Ahmedabad

A direct route of under two hours, served by IndiGo and Air India, so this leg is easy whenever you end up flying it.

Chennai → Ahmedabad

Nearly four weeks separate these two Tests, so this is a planning decision more than a flight. Check current schedules when you book, and see the Trip Schedule guide for how to use the gap.

Essential apps for this trip

Metro and transit

Chennai Metro Rail has its own official app with QR tickets and a journey planner, and Nagpur Metro Rail has an official app for tickets, routes and first/last train times. Ahmedabad's metro is run by GMRC, and QR tickets are also sold through third-party booking apps. Install the one for the city you're in, not all three at once.

Ride-hailing

Ola and Uber both work for the airport, station and matchday runs, and auto-rickshaws are available at every ground. On big matchdays, vehicles are often stopped 1-1.5km short of the gates at Ahmedabad, so the metro beats a cab there.

Tickets

BookMyShow and Paytm Insider for the main Test ticket sales. Set up your account before tickets are released, since the last India-Australia Test at Nagpur sold out within 10-14 days.

Mobile data

Airtel and Jio both cover all three cities. A tourist SIM or eSIM costs a few dollars, and setting up an eSIM before you fly means you land with working data.

Plan the route before you book flights

The e-Tourist visa only works through 33 designated international airports, so check your first landing point is on that list before you commit to a routing. And because there's no direct Nagpur-to-Chennai flight, book the Nagpur-to-Chennai connection early, and decide what the four-week gap is for before you book Ahmedabad.

How do I get to VCA Jamtha, Chepauk, and Narendra Modi Stadium?

Nagpur is the hard one, Chennai is walkable, and Ahmedabad built a metro station for the stadium

Getting to VCA Jamtha — Khapri Metro & Wardha Road

Getting to Chepauk — Triplicane & Chennai Beach Station

Getting to Motera — SG Highway & Stadium Access