NEW DELHI (Metro Rail News): Railways is firming up a cabinet proposal to corporatise Modern Coach Factory at Rae Bareli first as the corporatisation move of rail production units has gathered momentum. Officials of the Finance Ministry, NITI Aayog and Indian Railways are meeting this week to finalise the roadmap for the corporatisation of MCF, to begin with.
“Earlier, the proposal was to corporatise all eight production units of railways. However, now it has been decided to begin with MCF first and later on carry out the exercise for other units in a phase-wise manner,” said a Railway official.
RITES, a railways PSU, assigned the task of undertaking a study on the corporatisation of the rolling stock units, has submitted the report for MCF corporatisation. The aim is to make all our production companies market-driven and export-oriented, said the official.
Till now, all production units including MCF have railways as captive buyers and their productions were depending upon budgetary support but with changing times, corporatisation was long overdue as most of these units are not a force to reckon within the market, it was felt.
The corporate structure is expected to free these units from the rigid bureaucratic system of the government, which would result in gaining flexibility and improving efficiency in a coordinated manner. These units, which are suffering from technological stagnation, would be able to infuse new technology and also garner the financial resources to enter the international market in a competitive way.
The idea of hiving off all production units of the Indian Railways into a single entity, called the Indian Railways Rolling Stock Company, was floated as part of the 100-days action plan of the Indian Railways last year.
According to the plan, the merger of eight production companies including three each of coach and locomotive manufacturing units and two-wheel factories into one giant entity would make these units strong and viable in the world market with the latest technological collaboration.
MCF at Rae Bareli, which produces about 2,000 LHB coaches a year, would become an autonomous one under a corporate structure and is expected to increase its efficiency.
Currently, Railways is working with a holistic approach to modernise its infrastructure to make its network feasible for running high-speed and semi-high speed trains.
Ultimately, rail production units will have to produce coaches and locos, which are fit for a speed of 160 kmph, while the Railways has also allowed private players to run trains on selected routes.
The railway’s production units are Chittaranjan Locomotive Works, Integral Coach Factory, Diesel Locomotive Works, Diesel Modernization Works, Wheel & Axle Plant, Rail Wheel Plant, Rail Coach Factory and Modern Coach Factory.
