Alstom, Siemens, BHEL among 11 companies likely to vie for production of 58 Vande Bharat trains
24 Sep 2021
Eleven leading companies, including BHEL, Titagarh Wagons, CAF, Crompton Greaves, Cummins, ELGI, Alstom, Medha and Siemens, have participated in the pre-bid meeting for manufacturing 58 new Vande Bharat type trains over the next two years from now and are expected to participate in the tender to manufacture these rakes.
Railways floated a tender for 58 new Vande Bharat trains on 28 August, inviting bids for design, development, manufacture, integration and testing of traction propulsion electrics for the manufacture of 58 rakes of Vande Bharat trains. The closing date for the new tender is 20 October 2021.
The Railways had, in September last year, floated a revised tender for procuring 44 semi-high speed Vande Bharat trains mandating 75 per cent domestic component. These trains, with upgraded amenities as well as better seating, security, and surveillance systems were expected to be commercially available from June 2022 onwards.
The first prototype rake was tentatively planned to be dispatched in March 2022, which will be put to commercial service tentatively by June 2022, reports cited a senior railway ministry official as saying at that time.
Some of the new amenities and safety features planned to be added include four emergency windows for easy evacuation of passengers; disaster lights in all coaches, to be used in the event of failure of all other lights in a disaster situation; and more emergency push buttons (four per coach).
The coaches will also have a centralised coach monitoring system for all electrical, climate control, and other vital functions. An important upgrade in the new coaches will be a “pushback arrangement” for better reclining of seats. In the first two rakes of the Vande Bharat trains, issues regarding the seating comfort level were raised.
PM Modi flagged off the maiden run of a Vande Bharat train on the New Delhi-Varanasi route on 15 February 2019. The second such train service between New Delhi and Shri Mata Vaishnodevi Katra was flagged off by union home minister Amit Shah on 3 October that year.
Indian Railways aims to roll out 75 of the 102 Vande Bharat trains by 23 August next year, reports citing sources close to the development said on Saturday.
The move comes in the backdrop of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day announcement on rolling out 75 new Vande Bharat Express trains that will be launched to connect different parts of the country in 75 weeks to mark the ongoing “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”. These trains will be manufactured at the Integral Coach Factory, Chennai; Modern Coach Factory, Rae Bareilly; and Rail Coach Factory, Kapurthala.