Rlys appoint PwC as consultant for new units

Model to be ready within a month.

The Railways has appointed PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) as a consultant to advise the railway ministry on running its four proposed wheels and loco units.

The ministry plans to set up four such units, to be run on a joint venture (JV) pattern. It would be the minority player, while the technology provider would be the major player.

PwC will be preparing a draft model to decide on the finer aspects of the JVs.

The four units are to come up in Chhapra (wheels unit), Madhepura (electric locomotive unit), Marora (diesel loco unit) and a coach unit in Rae Bareilly.

Ministry sources said that the model will be ready within a month and the JVs would then be formed.

However, a decision is yet to be taken on the formation of a special purpose vehicle (SPV) for facilitating these units.

It plans to form an umbrella SPV for all the four units. Deliberations are on as to whether task of facilitating these JVs should be given to the ministry's subsidiaries like Rites or IRCON or the the ministry itself should handle it.

The proposed JVs would be for managing the units while the SPV would be to facilitate the setting up of these units.

Ministry officials however say that these units would not have any adverse effect on the government-owned diesel and electric loco units in Varanasi and Chittaranjan respectively.

Sources said the SPV (if the route is selected) is for facilitating setting up of new units, therefore the old units would continue as they are, while the new ones would provide modern technological inputs for manufacturing of locos.

In fact at a later stage, if it is found that a certain technology can be useful for the government units, then it could also be passed on to them through the public private partnership (PPP) channel.

Also with the dedicated rail freight corridor coming and the ministry planning to upgrade the existing coaches, locos, and tracks, there will be a huge demand for rolling stock and therefore the old as well as the new units would come in handy, officials said. Capacity augmentation of the existing units would also be done.