With the increasing demand of packaged mineral water the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has decided to set up a Rail Neer plant in Jharkhand.  This will be the first unit of Rail Neer in the State. As the demand for drinking water has increased the IRCTC to augment production and supply of packaged water on running trains as well as on railway platforms has decided to set up a plant in Patratu area under the Hazaribagh district.

BJP Ranchi MP Sanjay Seth said, “We have been demanding to set up a Rail Neer factory in Jharkhand. In the last Lok Sabha session railway minister Piyush Goyal replying to my query informed that the Railway has decided to set up Rail Neer factory in Jharkhand. The Rail Neer plant will be set up in Patratu area and this is the first Rail Neer Plant in the State.”

Seth said that setting up a Rail Neer plant will create employment opportunities as thousands will find employment directly and indirectly. 

Sources said that earlier, the IRCTC had decided to set up a Rail Neer plant at Argada in Ramgarh district having several coal mines of Central Coalfields Limited (CCL), but later the plan was deferred due to technical hiccups. These mines have surplus groundwater which comes out as a result of coal extraction. Sources said that the main requirement for setting up a Rail Neer plant is availability of land and water.  

To enhance passenger amenities, the IRCTC launched Rail Neer, a branded packaged drinking water for the rail commuters. Rail Neer is processed, purified and bottled at state-of-art plants. Completely automatic plant and no manual handling of product water at any stage.

At present, IRCTC has eleven operational Rail Neer Plants at Nangloi, Danapur, Palur, Ambernath, Amethi, Parassala, Bilaspur, Ahmedabad, Hapur, Bhopal and Nagpur. Cumulative production capacity of above eleven Rail Neer Plants is 11,64,000 bottles per day.

The railways’ sees a daily demand to supply water to commuters of around 16 lakh bottles, however IRCTC is able to supply only 37% of the requirement. The Ranchi bottling plant is expected to produce 1 lakh litres of potable water every day.