Amazon India strengthens partnership with Railways for faster deliveries amid lockdown

E-commerce giant Amazon India on Monday said it has strengthened its partnership with the Indian Railways and has ramped up its operations to 55 lanes in a bid to enable faster deliveries to customers amid the nationwide lockdown.

Last year, Amazon India had partnered with Indian Railways for inter-city transportation of e-commerce packages on 13 lanes, and had also set up pickup kiosks for customers in Kolkata and Mumbai.

Amazon India will transport consignments via rail across the country and is leveraging the 'COVID-19 Parcel Special Trains' introduced by the Indian Railways to ramp up its operations to 55 lanes during the lockdown period, it said in a statement.

Indian Railways with the support of the Railway Board and the zones across Western, Central, Northern, Eastern, South Central, Southern, South Eastern, North East Frontier, North Western and South Western have created a proactive solution to provide support for transportation during lockdown.

"This enhanced network will enable sellers in Amazon India's network to ship their products across the country and keep their businesses running, thereby, allowing people to access a more diverse selection of essential products," the statement said.

Amazon India Director (Amazon Transportation Services) Abhinav Singh said with the support of COVID-19 Parcel Special trains introduced by the Indian Railways, the company is confident it can further fulfil customer orders with enhanced speed and capacity.

"We are grateful for this timely decision by the Indian Railways to offer freight movement solutions during these challenging times," he added.

Under the lockdown - scheduled to end on May 3, e-commerce companies have been allowed to sell only essential items like grocery, healthcare and pharmaceutical products.

The players and industry associations have been urging the government to expand the list of essentials to include work from home' and study from home' products.