The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) commissioned a new rake for Mumbai Monorail on Wednesday which was rebuilt with the help of 213 spare parts acquired from vendors in Mumbai, Pune, and Chennai.
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The MMRDA reportedly rebuilt the train by spending ₹8 crores while it also sought the expertise of professors from the Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute (VJTI) along with the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) for the testing and commissioning of the train.
Officials acknowledged that getting the spare parts and other materials proved to be a major hurdle as the trains were originally assembled in Malaysia. Moreover, a bulk of the spare parts vendors were based out of Germany, South Korea, and Canada, leading to more difficulties. Given these factors, the MMRDA reportedly didn’t have any technical knowledge of these parts and components.
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Meanwhile, the MMRDA is considering the addition of one more train to Mumbai Monorail with the aim to improve the frequency of the trains from 30 to 35 minutes to just 18 minutes. Officials also said that starting next week, Mumbai Monorail will have a total of seven trains.
Metropolitan Commissioner of the MMRDA, RA Rajeev said, “Though we had 10 trains from the contractor, two were completely destroyed by the ex-contractors and one train was burnt in an accident. But we successfully refurbished two trains with a cost saving of about 74% when compared to foreign vendors.”
The MMRDA is believed to have invited new bids to acquire 10 new rakes while also hoping to get a better response from Indian manufacturers and companies.
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