Expansion plans at Indian Railways’ only PPP-model wagon repair workshop in Vadlapudi

Spread in around 203 acres in Vadlapudi, the Indian Railways’ only PPP-based wagon repair workshop is planning to expand and start construction of more workshops at the remaining part of the land. (Dheeraj Mishra)

“It is railways’ first project where the PPP model has been implemented in wagon workshop repair. Currently we do the periodic overhaul of over 200 wagons in a month. Our plan is to repair at least 1,000 wagons per month. For this the rest of the area will be developed soon. As the railways’ target is to increase freight movement, this workshop becomes more important because of its proximity to the ports,” said SK Senapati, the Chief Project Manager of BCL. Explaining the unique feature of the workshop, he said, “One of the important things about this workshop is that it has been constructed in a very small area, as compared to the others. Because of the Uni-flow repairing system of the wagon, the dismantling and assembling of the wagons are done in an orderly, step-wise manner. We do not need to store the wagon in the workshop and then do the repairing. Shunting or wagon driving is being done by Rail-cum-Road Vehicles. We also have an Automatic Stores Retrieval System which automatically stores and retrieves inventory in a warehouse.”

JV Apparao, deputy chief project manager of the Vadlapudi, said that in every six years, the wagons arrive at the workshop for the periodic overhaul. “In the uniflow system, body repair, bogie repair, wheel repairing, painting and testing is done in one flow and the product is the repaired wagon. We repair wagons of the East Coast Railways. Currently we have the capacity of repairing around 2,400 wagons per year and process it underway for its expansion. There is vacant land in the north-east side where we have planned for expansion,” said Apparao at the workshop.

Sudhakar, a senior section engineer at the covered workshop, which is 750 m long and 200 m wide, said that it takes around 4-5 days to dismantle a wagon and then repair it. “It involves a number of works such as ultrasonic testing of axles, testing of brake cylinders, cutting of the body etc. While a wagon has a life of around 35 years, it needs repairing from time to time. The new wagon is repaired in six years and the repaired wagon comes back for repairs at the workshop in 4.5 years. Around 9-10 wagons are being repaired everyday,” said the engineer. The Vadlapudi wagon repair workshop, which is one of the 18 such workshops of Indian Railways, was sanctioned on April 25, 2017 and its construction was completed on November 30, 2020. It was constructed by Rail Vikas Nigam Limited (RVNL) at the cost of Rs 381 crore. After outsourcing the workshop to BCL, the first wagon turn out from the workshop was on October 31, 2021. According to the BCL, it has completed Periodic Overhauling (POH) of 2,193 wagons by December 2024 for the current financial year 2024-25. In 2023-23, it repaired a total of 2,866 wagons, 2,005 wagons in 2022-23 and 309 wagons in 2021-22.

“There are a total of 18 workshops in Indian Railways which are engaged in the Periodic Overhaul (POH)/repair of wagons. During the year 2024-25, these workshops have been entrusted to undertake repair/POH of approximately 69,000 wagons,” said a senior official of Ministry of Railways. Indian Railways currently has over 3 lakh freight wagons across the country, which carry more than 1.4 billion tonnes of freight traffic every year over a network of 68,000 km.