What are these Mahindra Scorpio SUVs doing on a train? We explain!

The Mahindra Scorpio is among the best selling SUV in India. Mahindra sold 47,837 units of the SUV in FY 2018-19, which is a decent number for an SUV with that price tag. However, has this question ever crossed your mind that how the company transports so many cars to the different parts of the country. The delivery times have to be kept as low as possible and if you have bought a car yourself, you probably know how hard the waiting period is for a buyer, especially in case of an auto enthusiast. The video below by Abhinav LHB gives a good idea of how this task is accomplished.

As seen in the video, around hundred Mahindra vehicles are loaded on an open freight train and is standing at a station. This train is actually transporting these vehicles from one area to another far end of the country. Paying attention to the video yields one with the name of the station, which is Changasari. It is a town in Kamrup district of Assam but more on this later. As for the count of how many vehicles are there, we leave the exact number for you to let us know in the comments. An approximate figure goes like this – a total of 120 plus vehicles are loaded on this freight train which includes Mahindra Scorpio, Maxximo vans and Maxximo pickup vehicles.

This method of automobile transportation is more economical and faster than other methods like road or air when it comes to mass transportation over a long distance. The government launched the Automobile Freight Train Operator scheme (AFTO) quite a few years back which deals with the transportation of automobiles over long distance via freight trains. A lot of other manufacturers now use freight trains to send their cars far and wide faster. Take a look at the video below by TheRailzone if you are more curious about such trains. The video shows how cars are unloaded from specially designed freight trains.

As seen in the above video, most of the cars are now transported in special covered carriages which are made for this purpose only. These carriages are known as flexi deck car carrier wagon. This is because of the fact that that there is a deck inside the carrier that can be adjusted as per the height of the cars to be transported so as to utilize the full volume of the wagon.

The Indian Army vehicles are also transported in a similar way, though the carriages, in this case, are not covered. A lot of trucks and other military vehicles like the Gypsy are transported this way. Even tanks are many times moved from one part of the country to another by trains. The video below by b. r thakur shows how Indian Army vehicles are moved across states using Indian railways.

As for the question to why the Scorpio laden train was standing at that station, they were to be unloaded there. As mentioned earlier, the name of that station was Changasari, where a railway auto hub is situated. Vehicles are unloaded here and then sent to the warehouses where then they are stored till the time they get delivered to the customer. Note that the Scorpios and Maxximos have been set in a particular configuration in the carriges, with 3 Scorpios and 1 Maxxio in every carrige. This is done to maximize space utilization and fit in the max number of cars.