Railway e-procurement system IREPS to be integrated with GeM

New Delhi: Union Minister for Railways and Commerce & Industry Piyush Goyal reviewed the steps to promote Make in India products in the procurement process of Indian Railways, as well as the government. During the meeting, Goyal urged officials to take measures to generate confidence in the industry about corruption-free and transparent procurement environment at Indian Railways.

While reviewing the steps to promote Make in India products in the procurement process, it was emphasised to increase the participation of local vendors in the procurement process. It was also decided that the local content clause in the procurement should be such that the Railways may get more bids from local vendors and suppliers. This would also give a boost to the Aatmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan. The active support of DPIIT has been sought to make suitable policy revisions, if required, to facilitate the efforts of Indian Railways in this direction.

It was felt that encouragement needs to be given to such vendors who can supply higher locally manufactured content. It was also suggested to create an FAQ section and a helpline number so that vendors may get clarity on various issues relating to the procurement process.

A detailed presentation was made by the Member (Materials Management), Railway Board, on enhancing Make in India and steps being taken to procure through GeM along with the progress made.

The review meeting was also attended by Minister of State of Railways Suresh C Angadi, Railway Board Members, CEO and GeM and representatives of DPIIT, Ministry of Commerce.

A need for devising strategies for further increasing the participation of Indian service providers and component manufacturers was felt. Goyal emphasised the need to do Railway goods and services procurements of approximately Rs 70,000 crores on the GeM platform to open up the market to the industry even at remote places, and, especially MSMEs.

Indian Railways, one of the largest procurement agencies of the government, is integrating its procurement systems with GeM to use GeM's full potential. The department shared the timelines for the integration of Indian Railway e-Procurement system with GeM. The officials emphasised the need to have a seamless integration of the two systems eliminating the need for any manual interface. The strength of both the systems i.e. Railways IREPS and GeM, should be productively leveraged to generate synergy to take the Railways procurement to GeM's full potential, said officials.

Post-integration, GeM is intended to move further in the direction of becoming a single point public procurement portal for all agencies of the government.
During the meeting ways and means to create a corruption-free public procurement environment in India were discussed in which the Ministry of Railways, DPIIT and GeM have extremely important roles to play. The need for engagement of industry for developing more indigenous vendors to participate in the growth journey of the Indian Railways was emphasised.

During the presentation, it was decided that the Railways would work more towards having a user-friendly single step vendor web-based interface for all its activities. The website should, transparently, provide every interested vendor a clear idea of how to do business with the Indian Railways. The website should have all relevant information to generate the confidence of a corruption-free and transparent environment at Indian Railways.

(PSU Watch– India's Business News centre that places the spotlight on PSUs, Bureaucracy, Defence and Public Policy is now on Telegram. Join PSU Watch Channel in your Telegram and stay updated)