Soon, a large number of special rakes of NMG (New Modified GS’s) converted
from the highly popular GS (general purpose second class) coaches were placed at
the disposal of Toyota.Need to place your product such as a high end pricey car
in the show room in mint fresh condition straight from the assembly line — send
it by train! This is what the Toyota Kirloskar Motor Company opted for when they
had to ship cars from their newly created high-tech plant at Bidadi, 30 km west
of Bengaluru, almost a decade back. The move was made much more attractive
because of the 20 per cent cost advantage it offered for transport by road to
Delhi — its major distribution centre in North India.
Loading almost every third day it now despatches cars to varied destinations
such as Kolkata, Mumbai, Nagpur, Pune and Siliguri safe, fast and without a
scratch or speck of dust to mar its polished surface. It completed its maiden
journey to ICD terminal at Whitefield in 52 hours, a distance which normally
would take a road transporter in about a week.Three types of special wagons,
NMG, BCACAM, and BCABCM, carry 125, 265 and 286 respectively of small cars such
as Alto and Swift, in each rake.The day is not far when the Car carrier specials
trains too would provide car manufacturers time bound rail transport, getting
them to increasingly opt for it to varied destinations especially to Ports where
delays can prove to be quite costly!The writer is former member, Railway Board.
Each coach carrying 5 Toyota ended up with 125 of them in a rake of 25 coaches
delivered to Delhi for the highly lucrative northern sector.
Later, some high pressure marketing by South Central Managers resulted in the
TVS factory at Hosur also getting interested in this cost-effective means of
transport of their high-end motor bikes over long distances, mostly to towns up
north and northeast. With 10 NMG, 2 BCACAM and 3 BCACBM rakes at its disposal,
Maruti-Suzuki’s premier manufacturing facility at Gurgaon has its delivery
logistics pretty well sorted. Presently, 4 such rakes are in operation, around 2
such rakes having being loaded recently destined this time for Chandigarh
earning Railways Rs 20 lakh for each trip. Interestingly, the flexi deck wagons
carry Maruti cars for export reach Mundra Port in 36 hours, in the process
earning railways around Rs 32 lakhs per trip and saving Maruti Udyog almost
double the cost in road transport while assuring timely delivery for loading a
ship working to a tight schedule. Maruti Suzuki, which has been using rail
transport for over two decades using the NGM wagons, recently got 3 brand new
rakes of 27 wagons each with flexi decking built by Texmaco of Kolkata to RDSO
design (Type BCACBM ). In 2005-06 alone, a total of 63 rakes earned wholesale Brushless DC Motors
Rs 4. Soon after conducting test runs, the first batch of Toyotas left Bidadi
for Delhi achieving a major breakthrough in transport of cars by rail.On the
lines of the 'Conraj' trains, Railway minister Suresh Prabhu recently
inaugurated time-tabled container trains to ply the Delhi- Bengaluru route.On
the lines of the ‘Conraj’ (Container Rajdhani) trains which has an average
transit time of 42 hours from Delhi to Mumbai, railway minister Suresh Prabhu
recently inaugurated a time tabled Container trains to run between Delhi and
Bengaluru. Presently, only during the busy season of October-March, around 2
rakes per week get loaded with TVS mopeds at Hosur, where special arrangements
have been made saving it considerable haulage charges.
Capable of carrying 318 small size cars at top speed of 95 kmph covering
Gurgaon to Bangalore — their distribution centre in South India — in 5 days. In
a bid to reduce empty running, Northern Railways strives to ensure the return
trip carries Maruti Suzuki cars or Kinetic Honda scooters unloading them at
Dodballapur, a suburb of Bengaluru. Seized with the challenge posed by the
company located in its back yard, and looking for new avenues for earnings some
of the eager beaver Railway engineers at Hubli, headquarters of the newly
created zone of South Western Railway, swung into action and got the first set
of NGM rake ready for trials.5 crores in revenues for the South Western
Railway