Sitharaman lauds Titagarh Group's state-of-art plant in Italy

Minister for Commerce & Industry Nirmala Sitharaman visited Titagarh's passenger and metro coach manufacturing plant in Caserta (Italy) spread over 109,000 square meters covered space on land measuring 4,01,000 square miles and equipped with state of art facilities where the Group manufactures passenger rolling stock viz. Metro coaches, semi high speed train sets, double deck (EMU), metro coaches, 3 phase IGBT propulsion systems etc.

The Minister was accompanied by the Ambassador of India to Italy and received very warmly by the local authorities including the Mayor and the president of the local Condundustria along with the workers and management of the Titagarh.

During her visit, Nirmala Sithrarman observed the impressive production facility and said: "It is a matter of great satisfaction to find that an Indian company is playing an important role in the public transportation in Italy by supplying high quality and sophisticated trains, EMUs and metro coaches. This is a true model of partnership between the two countries which can have a huge synergy."

She said that while she was very satisfied that Titagarh has saved and created several jobs in Italy, this model adopted by Titagarh to also manufacture these coaches in India under the Make in India programme of the Government is a really welcome move and will further boost ties between the two countries.

She complemented the management and workmen of Titagarh for an excellent job in bringing the company back into full production. The minister inspected in detail the single deck and double deck train sets and also experienced the fully computerised trains by herself driving the train for a short distance. She appreciated the technology and encouraged Titagarh to introduce the same quickly in India and make these trains in India for the Indian market.

On the occasion, Umesh Chowdhary, Vice Chairman & Managing Director of Titagarh Wagons Limited (TWL), who welcomed the Minister at the Plant in Italy, said, "We at Titagarh are really pleased and honoured to welcome the Hon'ble Minister of Commerce & Industry, Government of India and thank her for giving us opportunity to showcase the capabilities of Titagarh for manufacture and supply of modern passenger trains and Metro Coaches to the clientele of high repute and consolidating the company's dominant position in the industry and this is a historic day for us."

Chowdhary also said, "Titagarh is the first Indian multinational in the field of railway rolling stock manufacture, and is the only Indian company which owns modern technology as well as designing and manufacturing capabilities for manufacture of Metro Coaches and modern train sets. We are in the process of setting up our facilities to produce these coaches with our Italian technology in India for the Indian market and will also continue to grow our European operations to cater to the European and other world markets. We have already started upgrading our facilities in Uttarpara, Kolkata for this and are very hopeful of being able to begin production of these highly modern, safe, comfortable and sophisticated trains in India. The fact that these will be completely Indian trains and coaches will be our humble contribution to the grand vision of the honourable Prime Minister of promoting not only Make in India, but also making in India a completely Indian product which will be of global standards"

Titagarh Wagons Limited (TWL), a flagship company of the Titagarh Group has successfully transformed itself from a wagon maker for Indian Railways to a multinational diversified engineering and infrastructure Group. TWL is the largest private sector manufacturer of railway coaches (EMUs, MEMUs) and the largest wagon maker (other than Railways) and exporter of wagons from India.

Titagarh is a leader in supply of wagons for defence, bailey bridges, NBC shelters etc. One of the earliest private entrants in defence, it is an 'Industry partner' to DRDO and 'Industrial License' holder for defence. The Group has state of the art engineering infrastructure spread across Titagarh and Uttarpara in West Bengal; Bharatpur in Rajasthan; Douai in Northern France.

Titagarh has successfully turned around the French Company, AFR which was taken over in a subsidiary: Titagarh Wagons AFR (TWA) in 2010 under the Group and is one of the largest manufacturers in Western Europe and 4th largest in Europe overall.