Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd

Pradeep Gaur

Chairman & Managing Director

RVNL is a major contributor in providing EI installations on Indian Railways in connection with most complicated projects of Doubling, 3^rd Line, New Line and Gauge Conversion. Keeping its high tradition, during FY 2023-24, RVNL has commissioned 119 Nos. of Non-Interlocking (NIs) of stations for commissioning of Doubling & 3^rd Line projects during the year.

Distinguished Shareholders,

It's my profound honour and privilege to present the 21^st Annual Report of your Company. The audited accounts of the Company for the financial year 2023-24, along with the Directors' Report and reports of Auditors have been circulated. Comments of Comptroller and Auditor General of India yet to be circulated. Your Company was established with the mandate of fast-track implementation of rail infrastructure projects working for and on behalf of Ministry of Railways as its executing arm. The contribution of RVNL is amply demonstrated by its performance and in 30 Project Implementation Units established at 25 locations across the length and breadth of the Country. RVNL is executing projects in all the Zonal Railways and 19 states of the Country. It gives me immure pleasure to inform that with the Navaratna status upgraded to your company in the previous year, Company is now working with greater freedom & additional responsibilities and scaling newer heights.

Financial Performance

In 2023-24, RVNL increased its expenditure on project execution from Rs 20,281.57 crore to Rs 21732.58 crore, which excludes the element of Rs 3911.93 crore as GST. Profit Before Tax increased from Rs 1644.38 crore in 2022-23 crore to Rs 1939.40 crore in 2023-24, and Profit After Tax (PAT) of the Company is at Rs 1462.95 crore, showing an increase of 15.38 % over the previous year. In view of the improved financial performance, the Directors of your Company have recommended payment of the final Dividend of Rs 439.94 crore for 2023-24, As a result, the effective management fee of RVNL got reduced from 8.5% to 6.62%, With this, the cumulative Dividend paid to the Government stands at Rs 1881.02 crore (excluding Rs. 320.45 crores towards final dividend recommended by the Board of Directors to the Shareholders).

Doubling / New Line / Gauge Conversion:

In 2023-24, 666.06 km sections were commissioned consisting of 70.19 km of New Line, 24.53 km of Gauge Conversation, 560.01 km of Doubling and 11.3 km of Kolkata Metro handed over to Zonal Railways for operations.

During the year, ten important projects were fully commissioned. These are:

Banspani -Daitari- Tomka- Jakhapura (180 km) Doubling

Khurda- Barang 3^rd Line

Raipur- Titlagarh (203 km) Doubling

Madurai- Maniyachi-Tuticorin (160 km)

Maniyachi- Nagercoil DL

Barkhera- Budni 3^rd line

Angul- Sukinda Road (98.7 km) New Line

Mau-Gazipur- Tarighat New Line

Lucknow- Pilibhit via Sitapur, Lakhimpur (262.76 km)

Hyderabad- Secunderabad - Multi modal transport system (Phase-II)-MTP

All the above projects were completed with Electric traction.

Railway Electrification:

During the year, Company commissioned 239.38 Route km (309.70 Track km) of exclusive Railway Electrification works on important routes. Apart from exclusive RE work, 571.32 km of RE was also commissioned with the Doubling projects. Thus, 810.70 km of electrified sections were commissioned in 2023-24.

Signalling & Telecom:

Signalling & Telecommunication (S&T) domain is a core expertise of providing signalling solutions for efficient and safe operation of trains on Indian Railways. There has been a significant induction of modern technologies on Indian Railways namely Electronic Interlocking (EI), Digital Axle Counters, Fibre Optic Cable Network facilitating capacity building in the recent years.

The effort of S&T team of RVNL in the area of Railway Infrastructure helped Indian Railways is able to achieve milestones in freight loading and operation of large number of passenger trains across the length and breadth of the country.

RVNL is a major contributor in providing EI installations on Indian Railways in connection with most complicated projects of Doubling, 3^rd Line, New Line and Gauge Conversion. Keeping its high tradition, during FY 2023-24, RVNL has commissioned 119 Nos. of Non-Interlocking (NIs) of stations for commissioning of Doubling & 3^rd Line projects during the year. RVNL also commissioned

53 IBS, 85 Kilometres of Automatic Signalling using Electronic Interlocking and 69 mid-section level crossing gates interlocking with signals to improve safety of road user. Not only on the Signalling front, RVNL has also had the incredible achievement in telecommunication by providing 4090 km of Fibre Optic Network and 6 Quad Cable network during the year.

RVNL has an in-house team of IRSTELO license holders who are competent to approve Logic & Interface Circuits and design drawings of all types of Railway signaling systems in-house. Besides, Railway Board had entrusted RVNL to approve Logic & Interface Circuits through 3^rd Party IRSTELO license holders for CR, SCR, WR & WCR up to 75 routes. RVNL, till date has approved Logic & Interface Circuits of more than 100 stations. This has reduced the workload of Zonal Railways on document approval organization and expedited the approval process of Logic & Interface Circuits and resulted in timely commissioning of large number of stations by RVNL to adhere the target set by Railway Board. RVNL S&T has participated in tenders of Automatic Signalling of Zonal Railways and has secured three Automatic Signalling works of Rs 262.04 Cr (SCR, NWR & NCR) during FY 2023-24. Out of these, one work spanning over 51 Km (06 Block section & 07 stations) has been completed & commissioned in 2023-24.

Hill Railway Projects:

Extraordinary progress was made on the three hill rail projects assigned to RVNL by IR i.e. Rishikesh-Karnaprayag section in Uttarakhand, Bhanupali-Bilaspur-Beri section in Himachal Pradesh and Budni- Barkhera- 3^rd line project in Madhya Pradesh. 67.33 km of tunnelling was completed by RVNL in 2023-24. As a, Two Tunnel Boring Machines were commissioned by RVNL for the first time in Himalayan geology in Indian Railways and are performing well. This is manifestation of RVNL'S prowess in tunnelling. The challenging Budni- Barkhera- 3^rd line project was fully commissioned during the year.

Workshops:

RVNL has proven capability for planning and delivery of State-of-the-Art Railway Workshops and augmentation of capacity of Production Units. RVNL had successfully completed 17workshop projects up to 2022-23. During the year, following two more Workshop projects were fully completed:

Khurda Road - Construction of main line electrical multiple unit car shed (Phase-2): completed in September 2023.

Vadodara - Setting up of New PoH Shop for Electrical Locos: completed in December 2023.

Metro Projects:

The project of Kolkata Metro has continuous challenge of acquisition of land, clearances and removal of hindrances and utilities by the local authorities.

During the year, Majerhat - Taratala (2.5 km) section of Joka- Binoy Badal Dinesh Bagh section of Kolkata Metro and Hemanta Mukhopadhyay – Beliaghata (8.80 km) section of New Garia- Biman Bandar Section of Metro Railway were commissioned. Thus ……. Km of Metro Project in Kolkata has been commissioned by RVNL.

Pamban – Vertical Lifting Bridge:

The work on the country's only movable rail bridge at Rameshwaram is progressing well with the State of Art technology. This work will be completed in 2024-25.

Special Purpose Vehicles:

RVNL is proud to not only successfully establish but also commission five joint venture Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) in partnership with various stakeholders including Ports, Mines, State Governments etc. for implementation of rail connectivity projects. RVNL has contributed an equity of Rs 1485.74 crore. Against this project worth Rs 12948 crore have been implemented with contribution of equity by the partners and raising funds through Financial Institutions. These SPVs have generated Rs. 1,13,672 crore revenue for Indian Railways, without any investment risk of Indian Railways. In FY 2023-24, these SPVs handled 42888 loaded rakes and 107.46 MT freight loading. VRJN By-Pass line on Obulavaripalle- Krishnapatnam section was commissioned in November 2023. VRJN By-Pass line will facilitate movement of traffic from Vijayawada side to Obulavaripalle on SPV line. Angul- Sukinda New Line project got operationalised in January 2023. Budhapank- Kamalang section was commissioned in October 2023. Major beneficiaries of this line would be steel plants in Angul region (transporting iron ore from Banspani and Chromate from Sukinda) and coal based thermal power plants in Sukinda receiving thermal coal from Talcher coal fields. 3412 loaded rakes were handled in the FY 2023-24.

New Horizons: Works through Open Bidding

I am very happy to inform that your company is a very vibrant and resilient organisation. We have successfully ventured into a new phase by obtaining mega infrastructure projects through Open bidding. During the year, RVNL bagged following major works:

All the works are progressing well thus manifesting RVNL's technical capabilities and its versatility.

I am confident that with taking works through open bidding, your company will now scale greater heights without limiting only to Railway sector.

Human Resource Development

The primary focus of RVNL Management has been to not only attract highly motivated, skilled, and experienced manpower but also to retain them by facilitating the right environment, competitive perks and ample opportunities for a better career progression through training and support.

I am happy to report that HR team of company has taken commendable initiatives in 2023-2024 for improving the satisfaction level of employees as detailed below:

1. Timely promotions were made and orders were issued even before completion of requisite years of service in the particular grade resulting in no loss of service for further promotion.

2. Gratuity Trust- Previously provision of gratuity was made each quarter to meet with the future liability of gratuity payment to the employee without channelizing through any Gratuity Trust/Fund manager. Now Gratuity Trust has been created thus introducing financial prudence.

3. R VNL Medical and Welfare scheme- RVNL Medical and Welfare Scheme which provides medical benefits to retired employees of RVNL and meets other emergency needs of employees in distress was last updated in April 2018. The same has been amended incorporating changes and also streamlined the management of funds duly approved by BOD. Some of the amendments have also been incorporated in the Medical Rule of RVNL employees, thereby giving more medical benefits to the employees.

4. Various Competency building and training initiatives including online training of staff were taken such as training in Tunnelling, GST-ITC, Works Construction, RCM, Litigation Handling etc., Project Management, PPP and Project Finance, Overview of GFR & Public Procurement through GeM (with latest Amendments). Training in Auto Cad , BIM and Primavera shelling software is also being conducted.

5. 360-degree performance appraisal was done for the 1^st time in RVNL in 2023 (August to October) with the purpose of focusing on employee development. It was designed to identify strengths and areas for improvement for personal and professional growth.

6. Employee Satisfaction Survey (ESS-2024) was conducted in February'2024 to measure the levels of job satisfaction of employees in RAIL VIKAS NIGAM LIMITED (RVNL) and to determine the factors that influence job satisfaction which may assist the organizations in augmenting the employee job satisfaction level. Actionable insights derived from the survey is being used to improve work environment and policies.

7. RVNL has been following Government Policies diligently in regard to procurement through GeM and effective implementation of Public Procurement Policy for MSEs.

Out o f total procurement of Rs. 46.33 crore of & Services for the year 2023-24, GeM procurement was 200.30% against the target of 100%.

MSME procurement was 35.18% against target of 25%.

Procurement through woman entrepreneur was 5.24% against the target of 3%.

Procurement through SC/ST vendors was 4.40% against target of 4%.

Corporate Social Responsibility

RVNL is conscious of its social responsibility. During 2023-24, the Company spent Rs 29.71 crore on CSR initiatives, which is more than 2 percent of PBT for the last three preceding Financial Years i.e., Rs 25.24 crore. The main focus of the Company is in the areas of education, health, and sanitation.

MOU Performance

It is with a great deal of satisfaction that based on the overall performance, your Company got 96.0 marks out of 100. It retained ‘Excellent' rating by Department of Public Enterprises for the financial year 2022-23. The company has been rated Excellent for 13^th consecutive year.

ISO certifications

I am happy to inform that ISO certifications on ISO 9001, ISO 14001 & ISO 45001 for Quality Management System, Environmental Management System & Occupational Health & Safety Management System achieved on 24.03.2023 has developed a sense of commitment of RVNL as an organization to ensure Quality in all its processes and deliverables, sensitivity towards environment and providing safe and healthy work environment to the all our employees. Apart from this, ISO is also playing an important role in efficiency improvement of your organization.

Corporate Governance

RVNL maintains a robust system of checks and balances to ensure that the authority of decision making is exercised with due care and responsibility, to meet the aspirations of Shareholders and society. Your Company complies meticulously with all legal requirements and Government guidelines regarding Corporate Governance. A Report on Corporate Governance and Management Discussion and Analysis forms part of the Annual Report.

Acknowledgements

Intheend,Iwouldliketomentionthatalltheachievements of RVNL, would not have been possible without the wholehearted support provided by Indian Railways. I am also grateful for the encouragement and confidence reposed in RVNL by the Chairman and Members of the Railway Board and other officers, that helped RVNL in contributing substantially to its development.

I, express my sincere thanks to our esteemed Shareholders, Ministry of Finance, Department of Public Enterprises, the State Governments, Zonal Railways, ADB, IRFC, Financial Institutions, C&AG's office, our bankers and stakeholders in various railway projects and national and international contractors for their unstinted cooperation to RVNL. I would also like to place on record my deep appreciation for the devotion and dedication of all my fellow RVNL employees who have been pillars of strength for the Company and have delivered their best despite challenges.