Fulfilling the decades-old demand, the Center has decided to set up a coach factory in Kazipet. It has announced that the current wagon manufacturing unit will be upgraded to a coach factory. While there has been a demand for a coach factory here since 1969, with the initiative of the state government and the decision of the central government, the dream of a 55-year movement has been realized.
Kazipet Junction is known as a key railway junction connecting North and South India. Whether you want to go to the states of North India or the states of South India, you have to travel through Kazipet Junction. The demand to set up a railway coach factory at this crucial junction has been there since the 1969 Telangana movement.
Since then, while the passenger coaches required by the South Central Railway were being brought from Perambur, the railway workers and leaders here have been demanding that setting up a coach factory in Kazipet would be beneficial in every way. But due to various reasons, it remained a dream.
In 1982, the then Congress government sanctioned a coach factory for Kazipet. Land was also examined for setting it up in Ayodhyapuram, Kazipet mandal. Almost two years passed in the land acquisition process. After the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984, the coach factory was shifted to Kapurthala to pacify the opposition there due to the Sikh massacre in Punjab.
Then, in the wake of the demand of the people here, the Center once again announced a wagon wheel workshop in 2007. But later, due to various political reasons, it was shifted to Karnataka. This is why the Kazipet Railway Coach Factory issue, which has been a struggle for decades, was included in the AP Reorganization Act.
Item No. 10 of the 13th Schedule of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act -2014 stated that the feasibility study of the Indian Railway Coach Factory in Kazipet, Telangana would be conducted. But after that, the coach factory issue was put on hold.
After the formation of the state, the BJP government at the Center set aside the coach factory issue and sanctioned a railway periodic overhauling workshop to Kazipet in 2016. It required 160 acres of land. The BRS government was hesitant to hand over sufficient land for almost 8 years.
When the land was finally given, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who came to Warangal city in June 2023 before the last assembly elections, laid the foundation stone for setting up a wagon manufacturing unit here along with the POH works. With this, the work related to it is ongoing.
