Amazon Transportation Services Private Limited (Amazon India) and the Ministry of Indian Railways today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to further strengthen the existing partnership between the two for reliable and fast transportation of Amazon India packages through the Indian Railways’ robust regional network. As part of this MoU, Amazon India and Indian Railways will jointly work towards establishing a hub and spoke model for one origin-destination pair and leverage learnings from that to define requirements needed for scaling it up across the network. The plan covers first and last-mile requirements, transit times, cost options, and policy enablers to boost parcel volumes on railways. Amazon India will also provide recommendations on requirements to ensure speedy and reliable distribution network for parcel logistics through railways. This development aims to ensure more consistent operational timelines to meet the requirements of the ecommerce sector.
“Our association with the Indian Railways aligns with the government’s vision to leverage this iconic institution for India’s economic growth. It also reflects our focus on providing our customers across India access to unparalleled selection with fast and reliable deliveries. Since 2019, we have collaborated to create an innovative logistics model that combines Amazon’s e-commerce expertise with Indian Railways’ vast and reliable network. This continues to enable fast delivery of crores of products across the country. Going forward, we remain committed to driving more innovations alongside the Indian Railways to better serve our customers.” said Abhinav Singh, Vice President, Operations, Amazon India.
“I commend Amazon for the MOU signed with Indian Railways. This collaboration and partnership will further help railways to understand the need of e-commerce businesses and plan transport services accordingly. The MOU is an important step towards enhancing the movement of e-commerce cargo through Indian Railways. I encourage e-commerce sector to leverage the efficiency and sustainability of rail transport to streamline their logistics needs. Indian Railways has launched many parcel services as well as the Virtual Aggregation Platform (VAP) to ease and encourage adoption of rail for parcel delivery and I therefore appeal to the e-commerce business to use this facility for mutual gain said Ravinder Goyal, Member (Operations and Business Development), Railway Board, Indian Railways”
Amazon India started engaging with the India Railways in 2019 and became the first
company in the Indian e-commerce sector to partner with the Indian Railways to build an
express transportation solution via rail to carry parcel wagons on Rajdhani in Express on the Mumbai-Delhi route. Over the last 5 years, Amazon has diligently scaled its operations from one train in 2019 to 120+ trains in 2024, operating 130 intercity routes across 91 unique destination cities through railways. This represents a 15X increase in movement of Amazon’s parcels through railway lanes since it began working with the Indian Railways in 2019. Amazon India’s association with the Indian Railways has been one of the key enablers for the company to offer 1-day and 2-day delivery promises to customers across India.
In 2023, Amazon India further strengthened its association with Indian Railways by becoming the first e-commerce logistics company to leverage Dedicated Freight Corridors,
which is designed to decongest the existing rail network, increase the average speed of freight trains, enable the operations of heavy haul trains, link existing ports and industrial areas for faster movement of freight, and reduce the overall cost of logistics. The partnership between Indian Railways and Amazon India also aligns with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision to increase multimodality and use railways as an economical and sustainable mode of transportation and contributes to the larger vision of ‘Viksit Bharat and Viksit Rail’.