Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project may bring Bhel’s fortunes back on track
NEW DELHI: State-run Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (Bhel) is eyeing a major role in the marque Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail project, popularly called bullet train, ranging from manufacturing coaches and civil construction work to laying down rail links.
In a huge boost to India’s largest power equipment maker, it was announced on Thursday that the joint venture (JV) between Bhel and Japan’s Kawasaki Heavy Industries (KHI) will manufacture rolling stock for the bullet train project.
The announcement, which comes during the ongoing visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, will help Bhel, which is positioning itself as a transportation solutions provider, given the uncertainty in India’s fastchanging power sector.
Apart from being a maker of metro and commuter trains, KHI also manufactures the Shinkansen high-speed bullet trains.
“The two Prime Ministers committed to advancing ‘Make in India’ and transfer of technology in HSR (high-speed rail) projects, and expressed optimism in this direction. They welcomed the series of business matching efforts to establish India-Japan cooperation, such as the prospective technology collaboration between Kawasaki and Bhel,” according to a joint statement issued on Thursday.
Mint reported on February 17 that Bhel was looking to pivot from the power sector to transportation.
“Both sides will explore further strengthening of partnership in high-speed railways. They also recognized that there is potential for further collaboration between India and Japan in the modernisation and expansion of the conventional railway system and the construction of metro rails in India,” the joint statement added. Bhel plans to piggyback on India’s urban challenge, with 600 million Indians expected to live in cities and towns by 2030.
This will create a transportation challenge, with metro rail being considered as a viable option. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has spoken of plans to get metro rail in 50 cities. At present, 316km of metro rail service is under operation and 500km under construction across 11 cities.
“We are looking at transportation from a holistic stand point and apart from manufacturing coaches, the bullet train project may also include electrification, signalling, civil construction work, including rail links,” a senior Bhel executive said, requesting anonymity.
Railway minister Piyush Goyal, while announcing the advancement of the bullet train deadline by a year recently, said India will adopt this technology, innovate and then export it to other countries.
The public sector unit (PSU) has already started work on becoming a turn-key metro rail end-to-end solutions provider and has a technology collaboration agreement with KHI for the manufacture of stainless steel coaches as well as bogies for the metros.
For the bullet train, Bhel has a memorandum of understanding (MoU) which will have to be translated to a technology collaboration agreement.
A bullet train requires specialized aluminium coaches which the state-run firm plans to manufacture at its Jhansi (Uttar Pradesh) or Bhopal facility (Madhya Pradesh).
On Thursday, the Bhel stock rose 3.66% to ₹137.40 on BSE.
While a Bhel spokesperson declined to comment, queries emailed to Kawasaki Heavy Industries on Thursday afternoon were not answered until press time.