A viral social media post has claimed that 22-metro trains have been made operational in Sydney, Australia and those trains have been manufactured in India, calling it 'Made in India.'
Some posts have been accompanied by a video showing a double-decker train, as well.
An archive of the post can be found here.
(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)
(Archives of similar claims can be found here and here.)
We received a query about this on our WhatsApp tipline number, as well.
Is this true?: The claim is false. Firstly, this claim has been floating on the internet since 2019.
Although the train is functioning in Sydney, it was not manufactured in India. The project was given to a French company named Alstom to manufacture trains in 2014. Under a project finalised in 2014, Alstom’s Sricity facility in Andhra Pradesh delivered 22 Metropolis trains for Sydney Metro.
The double-decker metro clip is not manufactured by Alstom but, is a Waratah train and was manufactured by Reliance Rail, which is not an Indian company.
How did we find out?: At first, we undertook a relevant keyword search and found that this claim had been circulating on the internet since 2019. (You can see their archives here and here.)
These old posts carried the same caption as the one mentioned before and carried a visual of a double-decker metro train.
With a Google reverse image search, we found a find a video showing the same double-decker on YouTube which was uploaded in 2018.
No where in the video was it mentioned that it was 'Made in India,' as claimed.
Following this, we conducted a relevant keyword searches and found that as part of a project from 2014, a French company named Alstom was given the deal to produce 22 trains for Sydney. The delivery was fulfilled at their plant in Andhra Pradesh in 2018.
The trains were made operational on 26 May 2019.
However, the metro train shown in the viral video is a double-decker, and the train under the Alstom project is single-decker.
The train design of the train plan on Sydney Metro website shows an interior which is different from the one in the viral video.
Here is the design of the single deck train.
(Source: Sydney Metro)
So who manufactured the double-decker train?: Using keywords such as 'sydney double decker train manufacturer,' we found that it is Waratah train and was manufactured by Reliance Rail, which is not the same as the Indian conglomerate, 'Reliance Industries.'
The company's websites asset section also lists this property.
The Quint has previously debunked this claim in 2019. You can read our story here.
Conclusion: Social media users have falsely claimed that 22-metro trains in Sydney were manufactured by our country under its "Made in India" initiative.
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