Sonia to lay foundation of 1,000 cr Rail Coach Factory

Lucknow, Feb 11: AICC president Sonia Gandhi will lay the foundation of a Rail Coach Factory in Lalganj (Rae Bareli) -- her parliamentary constituency -- on February 13.

The proposed unit will produce 1,000 coaches a year, which will enable Indian Railways wipe out arrears of over-aged and old-design coaches. Besides, it would provide job opportunities to the local populace, who have been demanding such opportunities in the region.

When the Lalganj facility comes up, Railways will have its third coach-building factory. It will have a capacity of building modern coaches, presumably the LHB model, which has become standard coaches for the prestigious Rajdhani and Shatabdi Express trains.

The Railways already own two coach building units -- Perambur in Chennai and Kapurthala in Punjab, which together, produce more than 2,000 coaches a year. Ms Gandhi had announced setting up of the RCF at Lalganj on December 6, 2006, while addressing a gathering at Unchahar in Rae Bareli.

In December 2006, the Railways ministry had sought approval for setting up a new coach factory at Rae Bareli at a cost of around Rs 17 billion.

'The proposal for setting up the new coach factory was put forward in the supplementary demands for grants in December 2006,'' minister of state for Railways R Velu said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha. ''The proposed production capacity of this factory is 1,000 coaches per year,'' he added.

The new coach factory in Ms Gandhi's high-profile constituency will take the number of production units under the Railways ministry to seven.

The six operational units, include Chittaranjan Locomotive Works, (CLW) at Chittaranjan in West Bengal, Diesel Locomotive Works (DLW) at Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai, Rail Coach Factory (RCF) in Kapurthala, Punjab, Rail Wheel Factory (RWF) in Bangalore and the Diesel Loco Modernisation Works (DMW) at Patiala, Punjab.

UNI