Railways Awards Tender For Supply Of 4,000 Wagons, To Help Increase Freight Carrying Capacity

Jupiter Wagons, a provider of mobility solutions via rail, road, and marine transportation, has said that it has received a significant contract for the manufacturing and supply of 4,000 BOXNS wagons from the Ministry of Railways.

"We are pleased to inform that Ministry of Railways (Railway Board) has awarded an order to the Company for manufacture and supply of 4,000 numbers of BOXNS Wagons for a contract value of Rs.1,617 Crore," Jupiter Wagons said in a regulatory filing.

The latest tender for BOXNS wagons is on top of the Railways’ June 2022 contracts worth Rs 23,500 crore for the supply of 60,000 wagons placed on Titagarh Wagons, Texmaco Rail & Engineering, Hindustan Engineering Industries, Commercial Engineer & Body Builders Co and Oriental Foundry.

The BG Bogie Open Wagon type 'BOXNS' wagon boast a axle load capacity of 25 tonnes, ensuring robust performance under varying freight conditions. The wagons exhibit a maximum speed of 86 km per hour when empty and 45 km per hour when loaded, ensuring efficiency and safety in transit.

Rolling stock comprising of locomotives and wagons is the backbone on which freight movement depends. As a major transport industry, the railways plan constitutes an integrated part of the national plan. The augmentation of locomotives and wagons is planned centrally at Railway Board every year by means of a rolling stock programme (RSP)

As part of this, the Indian Railways has also invited bids for procurement of 10,000 modern open wagons with advanced features, for which the first pre-bid conference was held at Rail Bhawan recently.

A total of eight wagon manufacturers including Titagarh, Texmaco, Jupiter, Besco, Oriental, Braithwaite, Jindal and Amstead Rail have evinced interest in the Rs 4,000 crore high capacity new-age wagon project.

This is for the first time that the railways is going for high capacity wagons, for which a new design has to be made. While the axle load would be 25 tonne, the capacity would be increased from the current 80 tonne to 81.25 tonne — for which the new type bogie and suspension system would be used.

The bids for the modern open wagons are expected to open by the end of February next year.