Page 56 - CIJ May 2023 Digital Edition

Laundry

When contracts were signed 5-7
years ago, we didn’t realise that
we should have invested in tunnel
washers. Given a chance now, even
for an 8 tonne laundry, I would go
for a tunnel washer. Though it is
capital-intensive, it will pay for itself
in 4-5 years.

Recently, there was talk of
the Railways outsourcing
laundry operations to a
single player who will
also look after catering,
on-board housekeeping
and other services. What
is your opinion of this Railway Board that they should LHB coaches, new trains and
model? consider transforming linen from Vande Bharat trains for overnight
a cost centre to a profit centre. journeys, we project that by 2024-
I don’t know where BOOT How? By outsourcing the entire 25, the linen load will become
laundries will fit into this. A linen supply service through a linen around 1,000 tonnes per day. South
laundry operator has no expertise in rental model; the service provider Central Railways currently needs
catering, and a catering contractor will purchase, supply, collect and 56 tonnes per day; in a year or so,
has no expertise in laundry; these wash passenger linen, for which this will go up to 100 tonnes.
are two very different domains. the Railways needs to pay a per
Personally, I feel such a model kg cost, without worrying about I would suggest continuing with
won’t be successful. Some kind of anything else. the existing policy of setting up
integration of BOOT laundries into BOOT laundries in each zone/
this model would be ideal. How is the demand for headquarter. BOOT laundries are
on railway property, and can be
Can Railways go beyond passenger linen set to supervised 24x7 by the Railways to
ensure that processes are properly
the BOOT model? increase, and how should followed.
the Railways match this?
The Railways spends hundreds If laundries are clubbed with
of crores on passenger linen, Currently, the daily requirement catering, the laundries will be
without making any money from of linen is around 550 tonnes. elsewhere, and quality control is
it. We tried to impress upon the With the introduction of new out of question.

MAY 2023•Clean India Journal
56 www.cleanindiajournal.com