Rail Wheel Plant, Bela

This article is about the organization. For general information on railways in India, see Rail transport in India.
Indian Railways
Government-owned corporation
Industry Cast Steel Wheels — Wagons
Founded 2004 (2004)
Headquarters New Delhi, India
Area served
 India
Key people
 Suresh Prabhu
(Minister for Railways)
Vinay Mittal
(Chairman)[1]
Products Wheels for All railway wagons of Indian Railways
Revenue ₹15 billion (US$220 million) (2011–12)[2]
Owner Government of India (100%)
Website www.indianrailways.gov.in
Indian Railways
Reporting mark IR
Locale India
Dates of operation 2014 (2014)–Present
Headquarters East Central Railway Zonal Headquarters, Hajipur
Website www.indianrailways.gov.in

Rail Wheel Plant, Bela is a subsidiary of Indian Railways. It is situated in Bela Gram Panchayat, Dariyapur Block Parsa and Saran district of Bihar. It was inaugurated in 2008 by the former Railway Minister of India, Laloo Prasad Yadav. It was built at a cost of ₹15 billion (US$220 million). It is spread over a land area of 131 acres. Its management is under East Central Railway Zone headquartered in Hajipur. The project is being looked after by Workshop projects/Indian Railways, Patna.

Construction

The rail wheel plant's construction started in July 2008. This plant is a step to revive industrialisation in Northern Bihar .Indian Railway made history by awarding this project as EPC contract to M/s Larsen & Toubro Limited.It was for the first time in history of Indian Railways that a highly sophisticated factory was set up without any foreign collaboration. It was possible because of inhouse capability of Railway engineers and Expertise of World renowned Indian company .ECC division of L&T was involved in Civil & Electrical works, whereas Railway Business Unit (An initiative of L&T in Rolling stock projects) set up the M&P's along with interfacing of the equipments. Working in close coordination with contractors and Sub-contractors Railway achieved completion of project within stipulated timeframe of 40 months (which includes 24 months of original time schedule and additional extensions).

It was a challenge for Railways to start civil works in such a difficult site which is surrounded by river bodies from all sides. To add much complication the elevation of plant was lower than the river bed. Also the soil was so loose, railways made use of stone columning for increasing the load-bearing capacity of soil.

Nearly 3000 workers were employed during peak construction period and as many as 300 highly skilled engineers of various domains like Mechanical, Electrical, Civil, IT, ECE, Mechatronics etc. were engaged during project implementation.

Being in a remote area of Bihar, there was constant fear of unlawful activities by locals, Maoist. To address these issues L&T deployed 24-hour all-round security to plant.

Safety

Rail Wheel plant project site completed 1 million safe man hours. Morning pep talk and vigilant site supervision by trained and qualified safety stewards it was possible to attain accident-free working during construction and testing trials.

Villages affected

The villages of Dariyapur Block specially Laloo tola, Mushahari, Durbela, Babu tola, and Kochwara were affected as the land was acquired from the farmers of these villages. The most land was of Awadhiya caste and rest was of Yadav, Bhumihar Brahmin and a little of Rajput.

Indian Railways compensated farmers for the lands acquired from the farmers and promised them jobs in the factory.

Electricity

For electricity requirements of the factory State Government in collaboration with Power Grid Corporation of India founded Sitalpur Powr Grid in year 2000. It provides electricity to factory and neighbouring villages in a radius of 25 km.

Education

The factory has founded some institutions in the campus for the well being of its employee and neighboring villages specially for Bela Gram Panchayat and Dariyapur:

References

  1. ↑ "Railway Unit". Official webpage of Indian Railways. Retrieved 6 June 2009.
  2. ↑ "Railways Fiscal Budget 2012" (PDF). Retrieved 15 March 2012.

External links

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