Guwahati : Rajen Gohain, Minister of State of Railways on Monday laid the foundation stone of a Refurbishing facility of LHB coaches at New Bongaigaon.
Sanjive Roy, General Manager, N.F. Railway, Ravilesh Kumar, Divisional Railway Manager of Rangiya Division alongwith other senior railway officials were present on the occasion.
The proposed shop will have the capacity to refurbish about 120 LHB coaches every year.
It will have about 15,000 square metre of shaded area housing 4 cranes of capacity 50 Metric tonne & 10 Metric tonne and other machineries and tools for maintenance of the LHB coaches.
The shop will also have 4 buildings of 3500 square metre of Built-up area housing various sections like Electrical Section, Mechanical Section, and Civil works other development facilities like scrap yard apart from provision of modern and environmental friendly State of Art facilities like: Pre- Engineering Building Sheds (PEB), Effluent Treatment Plant, Rain Water Harvesting etc.
This Refurbishing shop assumes great significance considering the fact that N.F. Railway has plan to convert long distance trains from this region to LHB coaches by replacing conventional coaches to provide better comfort to passenger and increase safety.
The work has been taken up with an estimated expenditure of Rs. 106 crore and is being executed by M/S. RITES, New Delhi. The target date of completion is May / 2020. Once completed, this Refurbishing Shop will be of great help in running the fleet of LHB rakes more efficiently.
Speaking on the occasion, Rajen Gohain expressed the hope that this new factory will be able to provide direct and indirect employment in the region. More and more ancillary industries will also come up in the locality generating employment.
He also highlighted various other achievements of the railways in this region which include commissioning of the Bogibeel Bridge, introduction of various long distance trains, commissioning of new lines etc.
He also informed that, the Central Government has already approved electrification of entire 2348 km track length of N.F. Railway including all branch lines in Budget 2018-19 at a cost of Rs. 4,435 crore.
Gohain informed that work of the double line is already in progress in New Bongaigaon to Kamakhya via Goalpara section. While another BG line to Kamakhya from New Bongaigaon via Rangiya with a bridge over Brahmaputra near the existing Saraighat Bridge is also on hand.
Earlier, General Manager, N.F. Railway Shri Sanjive Roy welcomed all guests and gave brief description of the work. The vote of thanks was offered by Ravilesh Kumar, Divisional Railway Manager of Rangiya Division.
(By Hemanta Kumar Nath, Guwahati)
