Maruti Suzuki India (MSIL) on Monday said it has transported over 3.2 lakh vehicles using Indian Railways in the calendar year (CY) 2022, the highest-ever dispatch using rail mode by the company in a year.

MSIL is India’s first automobile manufacturer to obtain Automobile Freight Train Operator (AFTO) licence in 2013, which allows it to fabricate and operate high speed, high capacity auto-wagon rakes on the Indian Railways network, the company said in a statement.

Since then, it has consistently worked to enhance the share of dispatches through Railways. In the last 10 years, MSIL has seen a five-fold increase in railway dispatches in terms of volumes. For instance, share of railways in outbound logistics has increased from 5 per cent in 2013 to 17 per cent in 2022.

The company has transported over 1.4 million vehicles using railways in the last 10 years, which has resulted in offsetting over 6,600 MT CO2 emissions, it said adding that it uses 40 specially designed railway rakes to transport vehicles across the country. Each rake has a capacity to carry 300+ vehicles.

At present, it utilises seven loading terminals across Delhi-NCR and Gujarat and 18 destination terminals (including Bengaluru, Nagpur, Mumbai, Guwahati, Mundra Port, Indore, Kolkata, Chennai, Agartala, Silchar, Ranchi and Ludhiana), it said.

“Our strategy to increase the use of rail mode in outbound logistics has resulted in dispatching record 3.2 lakh vehicles using railways in CY2022. This has resulted in offsetting around 1,800 MT of CO2 emissions. In addition, we have been able to save over 50 million litres of fuel during the year which contributes to enhancing the energy security of our country...Going forward, we aim to further increase these numbers. For this, we are setting up dedicated railway sidings at our facilities in Haryana (Manesar) and Gujarat,” Hisashi Takeuchi, Managing Director and CEO, MSIL, said.

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