PM Gati Shakti: Maruti Suzuki ships 2 million cars via Indian Railways

Maruti Suzuki India Limited (MSIL) has despatched 2 million vehicles using the Indian Railways cumulatively. This feat makes Maruti Suzuki India’s first automobile company to attain this milestone.

The automaker has rapidly scaled up its vehicle despatches through railways from 65,700 units in 2014-15 to 447,750 units in 2023-24. Railways offer a congestion free, safer, and energy-efficient alternative to road transportation of vehicles.

The Japanese carmaker dispatches vehicles to 20 destinations, serving over 450 cities using Indian railways.

“Maruti Suzuki pioneered the use of railways for vehicle dispatches over a decade ago by becoming the first company in India to obtain the Automobile-Freight-Train-Operator licence. Since then, the company has systematically increased its share of vehicle dispatches using railways. Through our sustained efforts in green logistics, we have achieved outstanding results including cumulative reduction of around 10,000 metric tonne of CO2 emissions and around 270 million litre of cumulative fuel savings,” says Hisashi Takeuchi, managing director and CEO, Maruti Suzuki India.

“With our production capacity nearly doubling from about 2 million units to 4 million units by FY 2030-31, we plan to augment the use of railways in vehicle despatches, close to 35% over the next 7-8 years. We stand committed to the Government of India’s net zero emissions target by 2070,” says Takeuchi.

Earlier this year, under the PM Gati Shakti programme, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated India’s first automobile in-plant railway siding at Maruti Suzuki’s Gujarat facility. This facility has a capacity to dispatch around 300,000 vehicles per annum. The next in-plant railway siding is in progress at Manesar facility and will be operational soon.

India’s largest carmaker sold a total of 179,228 units in June, up 12.4% year-on-year compared with 159,418 units in the same month last year. Total sales in the month include domestic sales of 139,918 units, sales to other OEM of 8,277 units and exports of 31,033 units. Domestic passenger vehicle sales rose 3% year-on-year to 1.37 lakh units in June from 1.33 lakh units in the same month last year. Exports jumped by a whopping 56% to 31,033 units last month.

Maruti Suzuki India opened its 5,000th service touchpoint in the country in May. The carmaker inaugurated its first service workshop in the year 1983. By 1997, in a period of 14 years, it reached 1,000 service touchpoints. The Company increased its network by another 1,000 service touchpoints in 9 years, followed by 8 years and 7 years. Notably, the last 1,000 service touchpoints were set up in just about 3 years.

“Going forward, as we aim to increase our sales, a strong network of sales and service will be essential. In line with this, we will continue to add more service touchpoints in the coming years. Notably, in the financial year 2023-24, we added 400 service touchpoints, making it the highest-ever addition in any financial year. Many of these new service touchpoints are located in the non-urban markets,” Takeuchi had said in May.