Diesel locomotive Therefore, diesel traction became economical for shunting before it became economical for hauling trains. The construction of diesel shunters began in 1920 in France, in 1925 in Denmark, in 1926 in the Netherlands, and in 1927 in Germany. After few years of testing, hundreds of units were produced within a decade. Diesel-powered or "oil-engined" railcars, generally diesel–mechanical, were developed by various European manufacturers in the 1930s, e.g. by William Beardmore and Company for the Canadian National Railways (the Beardmore Tornado engine was subsequently used in the R101 airship). Some of those series for regional traffic were begun with gasoline motors
Diesel Locomotive Factory, Marhowra Ministry of Railways had received bids from six global firms: Siemens, Alstom, Bombardier, General Electric, CSR Corp and CNR Corp. However, Indian Railways rejected the bid of both Chinese firms (CSR and CNR) for the two giant manufacturing projects in Bihar. In January 2014, the Union Cabinet gave its approval for setting up Electric Locomotive Factory in Madhepura and Diesel Locomotive Factory (DLF) in Marhowra at an approximate cost of and respectively. On November 9, 2015, the Ministry of Railways awarded the contracts for Madhepura project and Marhaura project to Alstom and General Electric respectively in a collective amount of