Delayed Padappai bridge hits Oragadam industrial corridor's pace

CHENNAI: A 700-odd metre-long incomplete flyover at Padappai on the bustling Oragadam-Sipcot industrial corridor is now reeling from the one-two punch of bureaucratic apathy and infrastructural inefficiencies that has clogged an arterial stretch of Chennai’s much-lauded road automobile corridor.

The three-year-old pain point has prompted the representatives of automobile and cold chain behemoths – Apollo Tyres, Danfoss Industries, Daimler India Commercial Vehicles, Eicher Motors and Renault-Nissan Automotive India – to join hands and submit a collective petition to the Kanchipuram district Collector, urging her urgent intervention to mitigate crores worth of business losses every month resulting from this logjam created by the semi-finished flyover.

Condensed and edited excerpts from the letter dated January 20, 2025, a copy of which is available with DT Next, reads, “… representatives of various major (OEMs) manufacturing units located in Oragadam, and our employees commute every day through 450 company-provided buses on a four-shift basis in this region. The incomplete bridge construction has become a major bottleneck, causing prolonged traffic delays. Additionally, the poor condition of roads exacerbates the situation, leading to safety risks and discomfort for commuters. Owing to this, during the last two months, we have faced significant challenges in achieving our targeted production volumes. Hence, industrial productivity is also facing a corresponding risk at this important growth phase.”

It’s a sad state of affairs when you consider such plaintive appeals are emerging from Tamil Nadu, which has the distinction of having the highest number of factories in India, with a staggering 39,512 units (15.8% of the national total) in FY22 (per the Annual Survey of Industries, released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, in March 2024).

In fact, the first five months of 2024 saw it receiving over Rs 7 lakh crore in investments.

However, TN had to contend as a second runner-up when it came to industrial output, as it trailed Maharashtra which made up for 13.97% of the national industrial output, and Gujarat, which emerged as the frontrunner, with an 18.01% share nationally, despite having only an 11.9% share in factories.

Could the diminished output be attributed to infrastructural and connectivity issues?

Stakeholders believe the dip in production is no coincidence, as this reporter was made privy to, during a recent sit-down with the top leadership team of the Chennai manufacturing unit of the US-based automotive giant Allison Transmission. Members of the cross-functional leadership team comprising manufacturing, quality, customer interfacing, administration and HR, opened up on the malady of immobility in this corridor.

KS Sathyanathan, director of manufacturing and operational excellence, tells us, “It is a recurring nightmare for employees, who commute 30-40 km from and to the city. The delay at the gridlocked flyover at times exceeds the commute time to the city. We are unable to start the shifts on time and we have stalled our plans for expansion, as construction workers are unable to reach on time. As the mixers get stuck in traffic, the process of concrete pouring gets hit, which in turn leads to a domino effect of delays, undermining our production schedules.”

Daffine Joseph, Head, HR, chimes in, “As a temporary remedial measure, we have advanced the timing at the pick-up points by 10 minutes. As a result, drivers and employees begin their day at ungodly hours and they invariably end the day fatigued.”

Senior officials from Apollo Tyres, who spoke on condition of anonymity, also mirrored these sentiments as they recalled, “We were forced to change the pick-up points on our bus routes, and we advanced our factory timings for six months now. Overseas clients are compelled to keep their meetings short and head to the airport immediately after lunch to avoid missing their flights. Things have gotten so bad that the chairman and vice-chairman have been putting off their visits for over a year now.”

At one of the TVS group of companies in Oragadam, a senior official estimated daily loss from the traffic logjam to be around Rs 5 lakh. “About 150 women employees from Tambaram have now been relocated to a hostel in Oragadam,” the official said, lamenting that six years since the construction of the bridge began, there is no end in sight.

Around 90 per cent of the 1,400-odd workforce at this company reside in nearby hostels. Even higher educational institutions, numbering around 25 on this stretch such as the Dhaanish Ahmed College of Engineering and RRASE College of Engineering have not been spared the ordeal of inordinate delays. Needless to say, the industrial ingenuity of TN remains the biggest casualty of such negligence