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| Wheels of modernisation gather pace |
| BS Reporter / New Delhi Feb 14, 2009, 01:31 IST |
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ROLLING STOCK: The railways have deployed their investible surplus of nearly Rs 70,000 crore earned between 2004-05 and 2008-09 to increase rolling stock productivity.
Revealing its plans for the rolling stock, the government on Friday said the production of wagons during the current Five-Year Plan period would be increased from 6,600 per annum to nearly 15,000 per annum, exactly the same number Railway Minister Lalu Prasad had given a year ago while presenting the Railway Budget.
This time Lalu Prasad was presenting the Interim Railway Budget for expenditure for the first four months of 2009-10. Saying that heavy investments would have to be made to enhance the capacity of rolling stock and for technical upgrade, he stated that an investment of Rs 2,30,000 crore would be made under the Eleventh Five-Year Plan (2007-12), which is almost three times the amount allocated in the Tenth Five-Year Plan.
Apart from more than doubling the production of wagons, output of diesel and electric locomotives would be increased from 202 to about 480, he said. The railways have deployed their investible surplus of nearly Rs 70,000 crore earned between 2004-05 and 2008-09 to increase the rolling stock productivity.
“The emphasis on modernisation of rolling stock is a welcome step because sophisticated wagons will be required for bullet trains, freight trains and passenger trains with good amenities,” said JP Chowdhary, chairman of Titagarh Wagons, a prominent wagon and coach manufacturer in the private sector. He, however, complained that the government did not talk about public-private-partnership, which it could have undertaken to give a fillip to the rolling stock industry.
Also, in a bid to increase the transport capacity of the railways and to reduce the unit cost of operations, the investment outlays have been stepped up from Rs 36,773 crore in 2008-09 to Rs 37,905 crore in 2009-10. The passenger trains and goods trains capacity would also be upped by 22 per cent and 78 per cent, respectively, in 2009-10.
The work of construction of the Rs 40-crore rail wheel factory at Chapra in Bihar, which was started last year, is going on in full swing. Prasad said efforts were being made to start work on diesel and electric locomotive factories at Marhoura and Madhepura in Bihar in this month itself.
The wagon factories of Bharat Wagon Ltd located at Mokama and Muzaffarpur in Bihar have been transferred to the railway ministry. In view of the special request of local public representatives, the matter of transfer of the wagon units of Burn Standard at Burnpur and Howrah in West Bengal, to the railway ministry, would be discussed with the ministries concerned for further action.
Additionally, the railways have conducted successful trials of electric locomotives to enable running of double-stack containers on the electrified western Dedicated Freight Corridor. The railways loaded 794 million tonnes, which was 66 million tonnes more than the loading in 2006-07.
The railways would also be completing the work of gauge conversion of 4,900-km lines, doubling of 1,800-km lines and laying of 1,100 km of new lines over five years, said Yadav.
As against 504 route km completed in 2003-04, the target for 2008-09 is set at 1,000 route km.
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