Titagarh Only Bidder for Chennai Metro’s Rolling Stock Lease Contract

Titagarh Wagons Limited is the only rolling stock firm that responded to Chennai Metro Rail Ltd. (CMRL)’s Expression of Interest (EOI) notice in October for leasing out 126 coaches for Chennai Metro’s Phase 2 project.

These coaches of Package ARE04 are being leased by CMRL to reduce high upfront system procurement cost, and CMRL first publicly revealed its intention to do so back in June 2020 through a procurement projection document.

CMRL invited EOI applications in August 2021 with a plan to lease 42 trains of 3 cars each (DMC+TC+DMC) for a period of 39 years on the new 45.8 km Line-3 (Madhavaram – SIPCOT 2) and 47 km Line-5 (Madhavaram – Sholinganallur) alongside 70 other trains of Package ARE02 that it intends to procure.

The contract duration includes 4 years of initial supply & commissioning and 35 years for the rolling stock’s life cycle.

Package: Phase – II / ARE04

Brief Scope: Chennai Metro Rail Ltd. invites Expression of Interest (EOI) for providing 126 cars (42 trainsets of 3 carsh each) on lease basis for CMRL Phase II network and maintaining these cars during their life cycle against payment of lease/rental charges by CMRL on the basis of hourly running of trainsets for passenger operation.

This EOI exercise was performed to gauge the response from the rolling stock industry, and I’m pretty sure CMRL isn’t happy with it as other major players, like Alstom and BEML, with manufacturing facilities in the vicinity haven’t participated.

Next steps: CMRL’s management will have to make a call in the coming weeks – whether to move on to the RFP tendering stage (which would require technical & financial bids to be invited) or to scrap the entire leasing process. Back in 2017, Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) was looking to lease 150 coaches for its Green Line, but nothing constructive came out of that.

With this development, here’s a status of where Chennai Metro Phase 2’s rolling stock tenders stand:

Line	Coaches to be Procured	Coaches to be Leased
Line-3 & Line-5	210 (Package ARE02) – Bids opening December 9	126 (Package ARE04) – Titagarh is only bidder
Line-4	78 (Package ARE03) – 3 Bids Received from Alstom, BEML & Titagarh	none

For more updates, check out the Chennai section or my Home Page!

– TMRG