Production of Vande Bharat trainsets or train 18 has been mired in controversy (File)
New Delhi:
Amid speculation that the 44 Vande Bharat trains which are expected to arrive on the rails by 2022 will be delayed, the railways said on Tuesday that the trainsets will now be manufactured by not one but three rail units and will be on the network. rail over the next three years. .
Railways board chairman VK Yadav said on Tuesday that the trains would be produced simultaneously in three railway units – the railway coach factory, Kapurthala, the modern coach factory, Rae Bareilly and the Chennai Integral Coach Factory.
“A few months ago, it was decided that the three railroad manufacturing units would manufacture these trains, reducing the time required to deploy them by a third. The 44 trains will start running in the next two to three years. the call for tenders has been finalized, a precise timetable will be made available, ”Mr. Yadav said.
In a letter dated July 14, the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) that manufactured the first two Vande Bharat trains informed the Railway Commission that it would take 28 months to put the prototype rakes into commercial service and six months. additional to start serial production. , then 78 months to complete the manufacture of 44 trains, according to its estimates.
Mr Yadav, however, said these were internal communications within the railways and since the three units will be making the rakes, deployment would be faster.
The production of the Vande Bharat or Train 18 trainsets was mired in controversy even as the former was rolled out by ICF in a record 18 months. It was built at a cost of around Rs 100 crore and provided continuous service on two routes: Delhi-Varanasi and Delhi-Katra.
Recently, China’s national rolling stock company CRRC Corporation became the only foreign player to bid for the global railways tender for its ambitious 18 semi-high-speed train project.
CRRC’s offer, which has entered into a joint venture with a Gurugram-based company to place its offer as CRRC Pioneer Electric (India) Private Limited, is likely to be abandoned.
He is one of six candidates in the tender for the purchase of propulsion systems or electric traction kits for 44 trains – under the brand Vande Bharat Express or Train 18.
Officials said based on the cost of manufacturing the first 18 train that launched last year – Rs 100 crore, of which Rs 35 crore was for the propulsion system alone – the current bid for 44 of these kits would be worth over Rs 1500 crore.
This tender was launched on December 22, 2019 by the Integral Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai, and was opened on July 11. This is the third call for tenders issued for these trains.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
