Railways denies reports on free travel during Maha Kumbh
The Indian Railways has categorically denied reports circulating in certain media outlets that passengers will be allowed to travel free of cost during the Maha Kumbh mela.
The Railways will invite financial bids worth over Rs.20,000 crore for manufacturing around 5,000 AC and non-AC coaches that will be equipped with modern facilities and run faster than existing ones, at Kanchrapara rail factory this month.
The public transporter intends to acquire 500 Electric Multiple Unit and Mainline Electric Multiple Unit coaches per year as assured offtake from the facility to make local and mainline train services faster and comfortable.
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Equipped with automatic doors, forced ventilation system, bio-toilets, regenerative braking system and better interior design, the stainless steel coaches will run faster than the existing coaches.
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“We will issue the request for proposal (RFP) this month for the Kanchrapara coach factory in Bengal,” said a senior Railway Ministry official.
The financial bid is to ensure that responses from vendors meet the organisation's needs and are structured in a way that allows it to easily compare proposals.
In June last year, the Railways had sought requests for qualification (RFQ) for manufacturing 5,000 modern EMU/MEMU coaches over the next 10 years in a joint venture model.
The RFQ got a good response as Bombardier (Canada), Siemens consortium (Germany), Alstom (France), CRRC Corporation consortium (China), Stadler (Switzerland), Medha consortium (India) and BHEL, an Indian PSU, made the cut to qualify for the financial bidding.
Railways will have a 26 per cent stake in the joint venture project.
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