Driverless trains under ‘Make in India’
BEML, a public sector undertaking of the Government has bagged a contract for Rs.3,015 crore for Mumbai Metro Corridor, with a lowest bid among seven bidders, six of which were internationally renowned companies.
The order includes manufacturing of 378 Metro cars (63 Metro trains of 6 cars each) for Mumbai Metro Corridor 2A, 2B & 7, it was announced on 23 Nov 2018.
The state of art, driverless trains will be manufactured indigenously by BEML. Supply of trains will begin from October 2020 and completed by December 2022.
BEML has earlier also supplied metro coaches in smaller numbers but along with an international player as a JV partner. It has now sub-contracted Hitachi only for some designs.
The coaches will be manufactured in the BEML factory at Bengaluru.
Some of the salient features are:
Total Trains: 63
Coaches per Train: 6
Fully Air Conditioned
Driverless train compatibility
Energy friendly with regenerative braking system. Train to operate on 25 KV AC traction.
Equipped with CCTV surveillance for passenger security and real-time track monitoring.
Carrying capacity of 300 passengers in each coach.
Stainless steel body with 4 doors on each side.
Evolution of metro rail in India is indeed a breath-taking story. Today about 536 kms of metro lines are operational in 10 different cities namely, Delhi & NCR (317 km), Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Chennai, Jaipur, Kochi, Lucknow, Mumbai and Gurugram.
In addition, more than 650 kms of metro rail projects are under construction in Delhi & NCR, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Chennai, Kochi, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Nagpur, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Pune, Bhopal and Indore. Many more cities are also planning metro rail system.
The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) said it has made concerted efforts for indigenisation of metro rail systems in the country.
For this, it has standardized the specifications for metro rolling-stock, signalling, telecom, electrical and civil components.
It has also adopted the Public Procurement Order, Make in India (PPO/MII) 2017, for metro rail systems.
MoHUA has also stipulated that minimum 75% of the coaches procured against any tender have to be manufactured in India.
Alstom, Bombardier, BEML, and Titagarh have setup manufacturing units in India.
As a result of the “Make in India” initiatives, the last two big procurement orders for rolling stock in India, floated on international competitive bidding model, have gone to Indian companies. This has also resulted in substantial reduction in cost.
This is one of the largest orders of metro rail coaches in the recent times.
BEML has bagged this contract purely on its own competence.
The award price per coach which is less than Rs.8.00 crore (including spares, design, installation, and commissioning) is record lowest in recent times.
Seven International manufacturers of rolling stock viz. Alstom, Bombardier, CAF, CRRC, Titagarh, BEML, Hyundai Rotem, participated in the bid.
The project is being assisted by Asian Development Bank and the procurement has been done following their guidelines and concurrence.
Metro line 2A will connect Dahisar to DN Nagar in Mumbai. Metro line 2B will run further from DN Nagar to Mankhurd via Bandra, and Metro line 7 from Dahisar to Andheri (east). fiinews.com
