With the new initiative of Indian Railways, trains for transporting raw materials like yarn, fabrics, and products from Ludhiana’s textile and garment companies will be exported directly to Bangladesh.
The Ambala division of Railways has started this facility in collaboration with MGH Group. On 27 June, for the first time, a special parcel train full of the cotton thread was loaded from Ambala Cantt station to Benapole, Bangladesh for the railways.
At the same time, the 20-parcel van was flagged off in the presence of railway officials in Ambala on Monday.
According to Railways, customers availing of this facility will get duty-free from their respective factories across Ludhiana and Buddy, as well as end the solution of transporting export boxes, clothes, and FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) to their buyer’s factory in Bangladesh. Which is important for the boundaries of both sides.
Arti International, Cedar Textiles, Garg Acrylic, Nahar Spinning, and Burdwan Textiles are some of the potential customers of Ludhiana formation.
Senior DCM, Vivek Sharma said about the occasion, “Earlier, the businessmen in and around Punjab & Haryana were transporting commodities like yarn, fabrics & goods by road to Bangladesh in small quantities and at very high freight cost.”
Also, during the lockdown period, they were unable to transport these by road and it was then Railway staff and Officials approached the consignors and explained to them about the facilities to transport by rail.
“Accordingly, they have moved the cotton yarn by rail in bulk through goods trains, but for moving the consignment by Goods trains, it is mandatory for the farmers and merchants to mobilize the quantity in bulk,” he added.
To mitigate this problem and to facilitate the Rail users to move their quantities in smalls like up to a maximum of 500 tons in each trip, the Ambala Division of Northern Railway took the initiative and started the Special Parcel train to Bangladesh.
This has helped the merchants to market their products beyond the country border by transporting the Cotton Yarn in small quantities through the Special Parcel train. Accordingly, one special parcel train consisting of 20 parcel vans moved to Benapole in Bangladesh.
Each VPU was loaded with 430 cartons, weighing around 23 tons and the total weight carried by the special parcel express is around 468 tons.
The cost per ton for carrying by Special Parcel train is Rs 5,491 and which is very cheap and economical as compared to Road transport which is much higher. This will be the first of its like traffic from Northern Railway catering the yarn industry of Northern India & earned the freight of Rs 25,69,630.
According to Sunil Tangri, commercial head of Vardhman Textiles, Ludhiana, “The train service to Benapole will help the whole textile industry in this region to commit to stringent delivery schedule and that in turn will increase India’s exports and boost economic trade between two neighboring countries.”
Dr. Ritika Vashisht, DCM-I Ambala, Dr. Kanishka, DCM-II Ambala, Himanshu Pant, director & CEO of MGH India were present along with other officials at the flagging off ceremony of the train.
