Under the Rajasthan Export Promotion Policy 2024, the freight and logistics subsidy is reimbursed at 25% of expenditure, capped at ₹25 lakh per exporting unit per annum. For a unit shipping in volume, that is routinely the single largest line in a REPP claim — often more than half the total.
It is also the line most frequently disallowed. Not because exporters get the rate wrong, but because two conditions sit underneath the headline percentage and neither is obvious from a summary.
Condition one: routing
The subsidy applies to goods sent through a State Inland Container Depot or the air cargo complex. Shipments routed otherwise do not qualify.
This catches a large number of otherwise eligible Rajasthan units, because routing decisions are usually made on logistics cost and transit time by a freight forwarder who has no visibility of the incentive position. A unit shipping through a port outside the State may be making a perfectly sound operational choice — and forfeiting the entire freight claim without ever being told there was a trade-off.
Practical implication
Routing is an incentive decision as much as a logistics one. The comparison worth running is landed cost net of the subsidy, not landed cost alone. That calculation should sit with whoever books the shipment.
Condition two: first-time-exporter status
For MSMEs, eligibility for the freight subsidy is limited to first-time exporters. Existing manufacturing enterprises not previously availing RIPS benefits qualify only if they are first-time exporters after the policy launch.
This is the condition that most often surprises established units. A business exporting for several years may clear every other head under REPP — product testing, certification, marketing assistance, ECGC premium — and still find the freight line unavailable to it.
It is worth establishing this at the assessment stage rather than after the spend. On a worked example we set out on the REPP 2024 scheme page, removing the freight line takes a first-year claim from ₹20.20 lakh to ₹9.70 lakh. The rest of the claim is still very much worth making — but the number you plan around should be the right one.
The prerequisite behind everything
Both conditions above assume you are inside the scheme at all. REPP 2024 defines an exporter as holding both an Import-Export Code and a current RCMC — not one or the other.
Two failures recur here. The RCMC has lapsed and nobody noticed, or it is held from an Export Promotion Council that does not cover the product actually being exported. Either defect invalidates the claim regardless of how well the rest of the file is assembled, and both are cheap to prevent and expensive to discover late.
Where the freight claim usually comes apart
- Shipments routed outside a State ICD or the air cargo complex.
- The claiming unit does not meet the first-time-exporter condition.
- RCMC lapsed as at the claim date, or issued by the wrong Council for the product.
- Freight invoices raised on a group entity or trading arm rather than the applicant unit.
- The same freight expense already reimbursed under a Central scheme, triggering the anti-duplication bar.
What this means in practice
Check the two gating conditions before you build a plan around the freight number. If you clear them, the claim is substantial and worth pursuing properly. If you do not, the remaining heads under REPP — certification and documentation at 50%, product testing at 75%, technology acquisition at 75% up to ₹50 lakh, ECGC premium reimbursement — are still available and still material.
What you should not do is discover the answer after a year of shipping.
Figures above are drawn from our verified summary of the Rajasthan Export Promotion Policy 2024, Department of Industries & Commerce, Government of Rajasthan. Schemes are amended from time to time and operational guidelines may impose conditions not reflected in the policy document. Confirm current provisions before acting. See the full scheme page for the complete benefits table.