Railway faces supply disruption of forged wheels amid Red Sea crisis

National transporter is facing shipment delays of forged wheel imports

The ministry of railways is staring at a brief blip in its supply plans of forged wheels, which are used in high-speed trains and locomotives, as the Red Sea-induced container crisis has delayed the national transporter’s inbound shipments till August.
 

“There has been a non-availability of shipping containers worldwide during June and it is expected to continue in July, due to which there may be a delay in supply of imported wheels. Only critical quantities of wheels required, at a minimum scale, will be diverted to railways from the consignment that has already been dispatched,” said a senior government official in the know.
 

 

“The situation is temporary and expected to normalise in August,” the official added.
 

The issue has been communicated to zonal railways and production and maintenance units responsible for rolling stock.

Forged wheels are used in Vande Bharat trains and high-speed locomotives, and a domestic crisis of forged and semi-forged wheels had prompted the government to import Vande Bharat wheels from China in 2022. 
 

Following that, the Centre has been pushing extensively to indigenise the manufacturing of these wheels.
 

Queries sent to the ministry of railways remained unanswered till the time of publishing. In the July-September quarter, the ministry of railways expects that around 13,000 forged wheels will be required. Another official said that consignments from China have been facing delays for a few months now.
 

Container rates have been skyrocketing in the past few months because of the Red Sea crisis.

As of Thursday, the Drewry World Container Index is at $5318 per 40-ft equivalent unit (FEU) container, which is 274 per cent higher than pre-pandemic levels. The same index at the end of November 2023 was around $1300 and had cooled down to $2700 following the first Red Sea crisis peak.
 

According to Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, the upcoming Rs 12000-crore forged wheel facility, won through a tendering process by a consortium led by Ramkrishna Forgings in   2023, will help India become an exporter of forged wheels.
 

The railways typically needs 80,000 forged wheels a year, according to the minister.