Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited (RINL) has begun work on the $51 million Uttarbanga RINL Rail axle manufacturing plant at New Jalpaiguri in West Bengal.
The Chief Minister of West Bengal, Ms Mamata Banerjee, attended a ceremony to welcome the start of work on the axle plant in the presence of Indian Railway Minister Mukul Roy.
The new unit will manufacture and supply rail axles for BOX N wagons and others to meet the growing requirement of Indian Railways.
In 2011, RINL signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Indian Railways to set up a state-of-the-art axle manufacturing plant at New Jalpaiguri.
The axle plant will produce BOX N wagon axle for axle loads of 22.9 t currently with a provision for axle load of 25 t with 210 mm diameter of 516 kg weight for 22.9 t axle load, RINL said in a statement.
The new plant will have the facility of forging and heat treatment of about 50,000 units forged axles/per year.
P Madhusudan, Director (Finance), RINL, Kesab Chandra, Member Mechanical, Railway Board, RS Virdi, GM, North Frontier Railway and other senior officials were also present at the commencement function.
A $2.6 billion steel manufacturer is based at Visakhapatnam and is one of the major steel producers in India, also known as Vizag Steel.
