The rail coach production capacity of Integral Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai, will be increased to 1,700 coaches a year, up 13 per cent from the current annual capacity of 1,500.

For the year 2010-11, the Indian Railways has assessed a requirement of 18,000 wagons and 4,000 coaches.

“The total production capacity of the two coach manufacturing production units under Indian Railways is 3,000 a year,” the Minister of State for Railways, Mr Bharatsinh Solanki, stated in Parliament here on Friday.

The production capacity of the two coach manufacturing production units - Rail Coach Factory, Kapurthala, and Integral Coach Factory, Chennai, - is being fully utilised, the Railways stated.

To increase coach production in the country, the Railways is setting up a coach factory in Rae Bareilly.