The Hindu Business Line : R&D facility for forging industry coming up at Pune

Boost to domestic cos
The centre will have facilities such as a research and development lab, product testing, validation and certification centre and consultancy in addition to a management and technical skill upgradation facility.
The Emission Certification Laboratory was inaugurated at the ARAI's premises.

Pune , July 18

Pune will soon be home to the first research & development, testing and validation centre dedicated to the forging industry in the country with the Minister of Heavy Industries, Mr Santosh Mohan Dev, laying the foundation stone for the centre on Monday.

The Rs 22-crore project, coming up at MIDC's Chakan industrial estate, is a joint initiative of the Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises, the Association of Indian Forging Industries and the Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI), Forging Industry Division, and is expected to be operational by October 2007.

The centre will have facilities such as a research and development lab, product testing, validation and certification centre and consultancy in addition to a management and technical skill upgradation facility.

With Pune being one of the major automotive manufacturing clusters in the country, such a centre is expected to bring in benefits to the domestic forging industry's quest to go global.

Mr Prithviraj Chavan, Minister of State, Prime Minister's Office, Mr Baba Kalyani, Chairman and Managing Director, Bharat Forge Ltd, and Mr Sukhdev Ganotra, Director, ARAI, Forging Industry Division, were present on the occasion.

The centre is likely to benefit the forging industry in industrial research and development work, transferring newer technologies to industry, strengthening documentation and information retrieval services and disseminating relevant information and knowledge.

In another landmark, the Emission Certification Laboratory (ECL) was inaugurated at the Automotive Research Association of India's premises. This is the first facility of the Rs 1,718-crore NATRIP (National Automotive Testing and Research and Development Infrastructure Project). An investment of Rs 11 crore has been sanctioned for ECL, which would help in upgradation of the existing facilities.

The main activity of ECL is to certify mass emission norms as per the Central Motor Vehicles Rules which includes two, three and four-wheelers, engines for light commercial vehicles, tractors and construction equipment and stationery applications.

Chennai facility soon

Mr D.J. Kulkarni, Deputy Director, ARAI, said Maneswar near Gurgaon has a similar facility and Chennai would be the next location where a similar facility would be set up. The Maneswar facility was for testing the noise vibration harshness, vehicle testing and crash testing and has been in operation for the past one year. The Chennai facility would be in operation in a couple of years and would have electronics as the niche area.

Mr Santosh Mohan Dev, said as part of the NATRIP project, a proving ground of international standards would be built at Indore on 4,098 acres of land as a part of the core NATRIP facilities. Efforts are on for setting up comprehensive testing and validation facilities including field tracks for agricultural tractors, trailers, construction equipments and various other off-road vehicles at Rae Bareilly in northern India.

The centre will house the country's first road accident data analysis facility. Two specialised driving training centres will be set up at Silchar in north-eastern India (for specialised hill area driving) and Rae Bareilly (for specialised vehicles and cargo). A model inspection and maintenance centre for vehicles will also form part of NATRIP facilities at Silchar.