IR trying to get back its modal share in freight segment: Suresh Prabhu
July 14, 2017: Minister of Railways Suresh Prabhu during the Indian Railways Round Table Conference on ‘New Alternatives in Wagon Design: Reaching out to Customers’ said that Indian Railways is trying to get back its modal share in freight segment.
He further said that the Indian Railways new Freight policy has rationalised tariffs. Indian Railways is also trying to work on partnership with its freight customers. The new alternative wagon design is another step towards it. New Wagon Design as per the need of customers is a win win situation for both, customers and railways. Customers can modify / alter the wagons as per the need & railways freight share can increase substantially. Commodity basket of Indian Railways has also been diversified.
Minister of State for Railways Manoj Sinha who was also present during the conference said, “With growth in economy, the potential for growth in the non conventional sector is expected to be very high. Many of the schemes launched by Indian Railways have already led to investment by the industry in purchase of dedicated wagons. From the point of view of growth in non conventional sector, the most promising sectors today are steel, automobiles, fly ash/cement & container. We call upon the industry to come up freely with the constraints they face in increasing transportation of more finished steel through rail & their expectations regarding new types of wagons design & modification/innovations required to the existing types of wagons design. We also invite the industry to deliberate collectively and come up with the most efficient solution for rapid growth in transportation.”
For a very long time, the bulk of the freight traffic being carried over Indian Railways has been transported in the conventional open and covered wagons. In the past two decades, attempts have been made to design and operate commodity-specific wagons. This has helped in attracting traffic from other sectors to railways.
More and more customers are looking at the IR network for an optimal solution for their transportation needs. Some of the examples are automobile-carriers, containers, special wagons for steel, wagons for carrying cement, fly ash, clinker etc. In all these sectors, Indian Railways has currently limited presence. In each of these categories, some designs of wagons are available and are being used in select pockets. Industry has gained a whole lot of experience while utilizing these commodity-specific wagons.
A lot of suggestions for changes and improvements in wagon design keep on coming up from time-to-time. It was considered appropriate to bring all stakeholders on one platform so that their views could be incorporated for improvement in the existing wagon designs and associated transportation models. This conference aims to bring together the customers, wagon owners, designers, wagon builders and the officials of the railways dealing with freight transportation. The conference is expected to set the roadmap for the wagon designers and manufacturers to provide appropriate freight stock for the benefit of the customers.
