Fertilizer City
Fertilizer City is a gated township in Ramagundam, Karimnagar district in the Indian state of Telangana.
History
Township was built in late 1970's for housing the employees of the Ramagundam unit of Fertilizer Corporation of India. Production was stopped from 1 April 1999 as a result of Government of India's policy and majority of employees were released on Voluntary Separation Scheme (VSS) by 2002-03. Presently very few are on the payroll of Corporation to look after safety and security of properties and discharge statutory obligations of the Company.
Ramagundam unit was unique in terms of Urea and Ammonia production wherein coal gasification methodology was used - FCI Ramagundam (simultaneously with FCI Talcher) was the first fertilizer plant in India to use coal gasification technology besides being world's biggest coal gasification based fertilizer unit.
Layout and facilities
Fertilizer City is a gated township with two entrances having over 1,200 housing units with a shopping complex, hospital, banks, recreation centre, club, 2 guest houses, 4 parks, few temples, a church, gurudwara and a mosque. The township also has badminton, basketball, cricket, shuttle, soccer, tennis, volleyball courts/grounds - also a movie theatre in the recreation centre. Movies were played on weekends during 1980's - from the mid 1980s the township has had a cable television network (first in India). The fertilizer factory spreaded over 1500 acres and the township is of 2500 acres.
Schools
- Kendriya Vidyalaya FCI (Elementary, Middle & High School)
- Chinmaya School (Elementary, Middle & High School) -- closed in early 90s and DAV management took over the school
- DAV School (Elementary, Middle & High School)
- ZP School (Elementary, Middle & High School up to 10th Grade only)
All schools were closed by 2003.
Transportation
APSRTC runs daily bus services to several local and Intra-State destinations including State Capital city Hyderabad.
Auto-Rickshaw bay/stand is present inside the township. Auto-Rickshaws are generally used to get to Ramagundam Railway Station.
Current status
On 14th jan 2015 NDA governament assigned joint venture (NFL+EIL) to revive the plant. The new joint venture named as "Ramagundam Fertilizers and Chemicals Ltd".
On 11 January 2008 Indian government announced it will revive FCI Ramagundam with an investment of around INR 45000 million. This decision was in response to repeated pleas from the state government due to shortage in fertilizers as well as the increasing fertilizer subsidy bill. On revival FCI will provide employment to about 10,000 people.[1]
It has been announced that a new gas-based mega fertilizer unit with an estimated cost of INR 5000 crores will be established at Ramagundam - a consortium of PSU's (National Fertilizers Ltd., Engineers India Ltd. and FCI) has been entrusted the responsibility to implement the same. It is reported that the zero date (as of now) has been fixed to be somewhere in 2017.
References
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