Building Construction Equipment in India: Models, Tenders, Companies and News

What counts as building construction equipment?

Building construction equipment is the set of machines that takes a building from an empty plot to a finished frame. On most Indian sites the work runs in the same order. Backhoe loaders and small excavators clear the plot and dig the footings, the basement and the service trenches. A soil compactor firms up the plinth fill and the site roads.

The frame needs concrete. It arrives in transit mixers from a ready-mix plant, or a self-loading mixer makes it on site, and a stationary concrete pump pushes it up to each slab through a pipeline. Steel, blocks and formwork are moved with pick and carry cranes and telehandlers, and a skid steer loader keeps the site clear.

Several machines on a large building site are not listed on DesiMachines: tower cranes, passenger and material hoists, boom pumps, batching plants, piling rigs and scaffolding. The cards below cover the machines we do list.

Where is building work concentrated in India?

Urban housing gives the clearest picture of where the volume is. According to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, which runs Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban), the most urban houses sanctioned under the scheme are in Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, followed by Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Karnataka.

Public buildings such as offices, staff quarters, campuses and courts are tendered by CPWD, the Military Engineer Services, state public works departments and development authorities. Getting enlisted with them is covered in our guides to PWD contractor registration and MES contractor registration.

Building work is spread over many small sites, so hire demand follows the towns where the housing is going up. Each state page lists the machines, dealers and tenders for that state.

Who builds India’s large buildings?

Towers, hospitals, offices and campuses are built by EPC contractors working for developers and government bodies. Houses and small blocks are built by local contractors, who hire most of their machines. The list is alphabetical, not a ranking.

A wider list of the construction and EPC companies working in India is in our roundup of the top EPC companies in India.