The South Central Railway has decided to set up four more mechanised laundries in the state at a cost of Rs 125 crore in the next two years for supply of clean linen to train passengers.
The new laundries will come up at Kakinada (2.75-tonne capacity costing Rs 14 crore), Tirupati (2.75-tonne capacity costing Rs 14 crore), Vijayawada (0.75-tonne capacity costing Rs 4 crore and Kacheguda (12-tonne capacity costing Rs 95 crore). At present, SCR has state-of-the-art laundries at Secunderabad and Kacheguda.
The new laundries will, together with the existing ones, meet the entire requirement of bedrolls for passengers travelling in the zone. They will be set up on the build, own, operate and transfer (BOOT) basis. At present, SCR’s own laundries meet 20 percent of the linen requirement and washing of 80 per cent is outsourced to private agencies.
SCR senior divisional mechanical engineer Gagandeep and chief public relations officer K Samabsiva Rao told Express that tenders had been invited for setting up the mechanised laundries. The demand for quality linen (bedrolls) is increasing as more and more passengers are travelling in upper classes. The daily requirement of bedrolls (bedsheets, blankets and pillow covers) in the zone is 25,000 sets.
They said that about 5 per cent of the towels supplied were not being returned by passengers and the cost was deducted from the wages of bedroll attendants. There were also instances of bedsheets missing, they said.