Railway Board to invite bids for manufacturing 44 Vande Bharat train sets

NEW DELHI: The railway board has taken charge of timely manufacturing of 44 Vande Bharat train sets. After the Integral Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai failed to bid out the project for three times, now the railway board will float the tender on its own in the next one week.
Sources said since now the trains will be manufactured at three rail coach factories at Kapurthala, Chennai and Rae Bareli, it was decided that the board should invite the tender with provision of higher than 50% local component as per the latest Make in India order. Earlier, the ICF was entrusted to manufacture all the train sets. Recently, railway board chairman, V K Yadav had said that to meet the timeline despite delay, the national transporter will manufacture them at these three units.
Officials said this move of the railway board is a U-turn of a decision implemented a couple of years back to decentralise the system. “It was decided that the board will only take policy decisions,” said one official. The first two Vande Bharat train sets were manufactured at ICF.
Recently, the tender floated by ICF was cancelled on technical grounds as some of the bidders had disclosed details of financial offers while submitting technical bids.
Yadav had said “We are aware that we have lost at least three months. But we are confident we will get these trains before the set deadline.” He had added that railways will incorporate changes due to the Covid-19 requirements in the train set design.
The production of the Vande Bharat trains has been mired in controversy despite the first Train 18 rolling out in a record time of 18 months from the Integral Coach Factory in Chennai.