ProUI

Lok Sabha elections in 2014 have prompted the railways to speed up projects in VIP constituencies.Railways on Thursday signed a Memorandum of Understanding with steel ministry’s public sector unit, Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited (RINL), to fast-track the wheel factory project in Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s Raebareli.Ministers from both participating ministries, Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge and Steel Minister Benipersad Verma, were present to oversee the signing ceremony. The Rs 960-crore forged wheel factory was announced in the current budget and within a short period, railways arranged the resources. The state government has already provided 40 acres of land in Raebareli. RINL will invest the entire cost under assured off-take for around 26 years.

Only 10 days ago, Sonia Gandhi had laid the foundation stone for Mainline Electric Multiple Unit ( MEMU) coach factory in Bhiwara to strengthen her confidant and a state heavyweight C P Joshi. The foundation laying programme was to be organised sometime in October, but keeping in view the assembly elections in Rajasthan, it was advanced.

The Rs 1,000-crore MEMU project is in partnership with the Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL). The project took off during Joshi’s brief tenure in the ministry and an MoU was signed without delay.

 However, the Rs 600-crore rail coach factory in Palakkad in Kerala was pushed behind. The CPM government gave 400 acres of land in 2009 on the condition that it would be a joint venture of railways with a government PSU.

Following Railway ministry’s decision to hike freight rates from today, most domestic primary steel producers have raised prices of steel products on the back of increased transportation costs.“We are compelled to hike product prices since we have to shell out 400-500 rupees more per tonne of steel now after the rail freight hike,” said a source from Jindal Steel & Power Ltd.The Delhi-based company has hiked prices of some steel grades mostly in the flat segment in the range of 500-1,500 rupees per tonne.Most industry officials were of the view that though the hike was inevitable, the concern was the quantum of price hike given the current bleak demand scenario for steel in the domestic market.

The market does not have the required appetite to bear price hikes month-after-month, they said.

Slowing economic growth in the country has reduced demand for the alloy, in turn pressurising prices.

“The steel industry is already bleeding and to add to it if freight, power or tariffs are increased like this then steel companies have no options and are compelled to raise product rates,” said the Jindal Steel source. “The railway’s decision has been harsh on the steel industry,”he added.

The Railway ministry has decided to increase freight rates on the back of increasing fuel prices. Due to this, freight tariff will go up by 1.7% across all commodities. This freight revision is effective from today.

JSW Steel Ltd has also raised prices of most of its flat products between 1-2% and that of long products by up to 1%, said director (commercial and marketing), Jayant Acharya.

State-owned Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd, which produces only long products that finds wide application in the construction segment, has raised prices of wire rods alone by 900 rupees per tn.

“There is a strong demand for wire rods across the country and so we have hiked prices of only this product,” said a RINL source. “Prices of all other products have been kept unchanged,” he said.

Essar Steel Ltd has also increased prices for retail customers by 1,000-1,200 rupees per tonne and is working out the price hike for its large clients, said a source close to the development.

Steel Authority of India Ltd (Sail) was not reachable for any update, while Tata Steel Ltd has not raised prices so far.

Lok Sabha elections in 2014 have prompted the railways to speed up projects in VIP constituencies.Railways on Thursday signed a Memorandum of Understanding with steel ministry’s public sector unit, Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited (RINL), to fast-track the wheel factory project in Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s Raebareli.Ministers from both participating ministries, Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge and Steel Minister Benipersad Verma, were present to oversee the signing ceremony. The Rs 960-crore forged wheel factory was announced in the current budget and within a short period, railways arranged the resources. The state government has already provided 40 acres of land in Raebareli. RINL will invest the entire cost under assured off-take for around 26 years.

Only 10 days ago, Sonia Gandhi had laid the foundation stone for Mainline Electric Multiple Unit ( MEMU) coach factory in Bhiwara to strengthen her confidant and a state heavyweight C P Joshi. The foundation laying programme was to be organised sometime in October, but keeping in view the assembly elections in Rajasthan, it was advanced.

The Rs 1,000-crore MEMU project is in partnership with the Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL). The project took off during Joshi’s brief tenure in the ministry and an MoU was signed without delay.

 However, the Rs 600-crore rail coach factory in Palakkad in Kerala was pushed behind. The CPM government gave 400 acres of land in 2009 on the condition that it would be a joint venture of railways with a government PSU.

In a major foreign direct investment proposal in the rail sector, a Czech company has come forward for setting up a wheel factory at an estimated cost of Rs 200 crore in Aurangabad in Maharashtra."We will set up a 100 per cent Indian subsidiary to produce the wheelsets in Aurangabad in Maharashtra," said Joachim Marreck, CEO of Bonatrans India Pvt Ltd here."The wheel manufacturing unit wil be set up at 40,000 sq metre area in Aurangabad at an estimated cost of about Rs 200 crore," said Marreck, adding "the factory will be operational in 2015."The ground breaking ceremony for the state-of-the-art wheel factory will be held in January next year.Bonatrans will employ about 70 people in the fully automated factory in the first phase.A major manufacturer of railway wheelsets in Europe, Bonatrans has share of about 35 per cent share in European market and has already been supplying wheelsets to Indian Railways since many years."We are supplying about 10,000 wheels to Indian Railways and Metros this year. In the beginning we will be manufacturing about 20,000 wheelsets and 5000 axles in a year but our aim is to increase the supply to 50,000 a year," he said.

A delegation of Indian Railways will travel to Prague for signing an MoU with Czech Railway in November.

Railways requires more than three lakh wheels a year for its ever increasing number of trains. Currently, it depends upon import of wheels from China and Europe to meet its requirement as domestic production falls short of the total target.

Incidentally, Railways is also setting up a forged wheel factory at Raebareli in a joint venture with Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd to manufacture about 50,000 wheels annually.

However, the Bonatrans CEO said there is scope for everybody as Indian market is increasing and also becoming competitive.

"We would like to be very close to our customer and we are keen to cooperate with Railways in a big way as Indian market is opening up and very competitive also," he said.

Bonatrans along with several other Czech companies have participated in the recently held international railway exhibition here. Last week, Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge while speaking at a function invited FDI in rail sector.

Railway passengers in the restive Seemandhra region of Andhra Pradesh are bearing the brunt of ongoing strike by employees of state power corporations with many trains are either being partially cancelled or rescheduled.

The South Central Railway (SCR) today partially cancelled services of passengers trains running on Rajahmundry- Visakhapatnam and Vijayawada-Visakhapatnam routes in the wake of the strike by employees of Andhra Pradesh Power Transmission Corporation.

Employees of all three wings viz generation, transmission and distribution are on strike in protest against Centre's decision to carve out separate Telangana state.

While Rajahmundry-Visakhapatnam passenger train which left at 11:15 hrs was partially cancelled between Anakapalli and Visakhapatnam stations, a passenger train running between Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam station was partially terminated between Anakapalli and Visakhapatnam, according to a SCR spokesperson.

The Tirumala and Konark expresses were stopped at Tuni and some services are running behind the schedule, he said.

Meanwhile, the South Central Railway has set up a helpline at major stations like Vijayawada, Nellore, Ongole and Rajahmundry to update passengers about the schedule.

Anticipating power disruptions in coming days due to strike, the SCR is keeping various options open, including hauling important express trains with diesel locos.

Locomotives are kept on standby along Vijayawada-Gudur- Renigunta section.

"Another measures the SCR has planned to roll out in case of emergency situation are suitable diversions of long-distance trains via convenient alternate routes, shutting down goods trains and cancellation/partial cancellation of short-distance passenger trains to facilitate movement of express trains," the spokesperson said.

East Coast Railways today halted operations of four express trains and all local/passenger trains originating and terminating at Visakhapatnam in the wake of agitation in Andhra Pradesh, official sources said.

Power crisis in Andhra Pradesh is a factor behind the cancellation of the trains, Railway sources said.

The express trains cancelled on Tuesday were 17015 Up Bhubaneswar-Secunderabad Visakha Express, 12898 Up Bhubaneswar-Puducherry Weekly Express, 18411 Up Bhubaneswar-Visakhapatnam Intercity Express and 18412 down Visakhapatnam-Bhubaneswar Intercity Express.

However, for the comfortable journey of the train passengers stranded enroute, East Coast Railway has arranged diesel locomotives for movement of long distance trains.

Apart from this, food and drinking water provision has been made at different stations for stranded passengers, a Railway release said.

ECoR has also opened an emergency control room at Visakhapatnam for smooth movement of trains. Staff has been deputed to look after the proper arrangement of food and drinking water at various stations and in trains.

The Gorakhpur railway station in Uttar Pradesh has the world's longest platform,a fter it was inaugurated on Sunday (Oct 6).The remodelled Gorakhpur Yard was completed on a war footing within the scheduled time.Till now Kharagpur had the longest platform with its length of 1,074 metres. The platform in Gorakhpur is 1366.33 metres long.With this achievement, the North Eastern Railway has also secured a place in the Limca Book of Indian Records. The certificate for the same would be issued soon.The achievement of  Gorakhpur station would also be incorporated in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Anti-Telangana protests entered their fourth day in Seemandhra region of Andhra Pradesh on Monday as more unions joined the stir while 32 trains were cancelled. The power shutdown also continues in 13 districts of Seemandhra, comprising coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema. Normal life is

crippled as reports say ATMs are not functioning in cities while other services are also hit by the power blackout. On Sunday morning, Power Employees’ Joint Action Committee began an indefinite strike. They had announced on Saturday that 70,000 workers of transmission, generation and distribution companies would go on an indefinite stir.

Power production at the Kadapa and Vijayawada thermal units and Srisailam hydro units was also hit.

Further tripping could affect the entire southern grid, the employees said. Some media reports said even neighbouring Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala were affected.

On Sunday, protesters defied curfew and shoot-at-sight orders to clash with police and pelted stones at security forces. The troops retaliated by firing rubber bullets. Curfew was also imposed in Vizianagaram town after day-long violence on Saturday.

According to media reports, 20 policemen and 30 protesters were injured. Dozens of agitators were arrested.

The proposal of the railways to set up an AC loco maintenance shed in Ernakulam has kicked up a row with railway employees alleging that the move is political in nature.According to officials, the railways has set aside `20 crore for setting up the AC loco shed on the Ernakulam junction premises.A letter has been forwarded by the General Manager of the Southern Railways to the Railway Board for approval.The decision to set up the AC loco shed was taken as most of the trains in the Thiruvananthapuram division ran on electric engines, the officials said. However, the railway employees allege that the move to set up the AC loco shed and in turn transfer the diesel loco shed from Kerala to Tamil Nadu or Karnataka was political.They said the move was a huge blow to the 350 employees currently working in the diesel loco shed, which is Kerala’s only diesel engine maintenance facility.Southern Railway Mazdoor Union (SRMU) divisional president P Unnikrishnan said since the repair and maintenance work of diesel locos is different from electric engines, it is also highly unlikely that these employees will be reinstated.“We are not against the construction of a new AC loco shed here. However, if there is any move to shift the diesel shed to a different place, the management should take us into confidence. There is a huge possibility that the employees will be transferred to other locations, i.e., to other states where the diesel shed will be relocated. We demand that the management either withdraw the move or hold talks with us in this regard to allay the fears of the employees,” Unnikrishnan said.

The SRMU will observe black day on Monday and is gearing up for a statewide agitation in the coming days.

Railway officials here said there were possibilities to set up the AC loco shed without disturbing the diesel loco shed.

“However, we have not been given any briefing regarding this because the proposal is in the initial stages,” Ernakulam area manager P L Ashok Kumar said.

As the electricity employees went on strike in the coastal districts and the Rayalaseema area of Andhra Pradesh against the Union Government’s decision to bifurcate the State and form Telangana, power supply was disrupted on Monday and there was a blackout in most of the coastal towns and villages. All industries, commercial establishments and other institutions were badly hit.The Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, which experienced a minor disruption in production on Sunday, was totally disconnected from the State power grid on Monday and the plant was running solely on captive power units with a capacity of 240 MW. Sources said only the most essential systems were being maintained as otherwise there may be a total shutdown and production was badly hit.Other industries in Visakhapatnam and other towns had to stop production because of the power cut. Several trains on the Vijayawada-Chennai, Visakhapatnam-Vijayawada and the Visakhapatnam-Bhubaneswar sections were stopped because of the disruption in power supply. The railway authorities were moving trains on diesel engines. Passenger trains and goods trains were cancelled and several long-distance trains regulated due to the critical situation.

Curfew in force in Vizianagaram

The situation in Vizianagaram town, 60 km from here, where properties of the Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee President, B. Satyanarayana, were attacked, remained tense but under control, according to the police. Curfew continued in the town for the third day and there was a heavy deployment of rapid action police force.

Power generation at the Narla Tata Rao thermal power station at Ibrahimpatnam near Vijayawada came to a total halt on Sunday night. The plant generates 1750 MW of power.

sarma.rs@the.hindu.co.in