KoPT expects 1 lakh TEUs after mechanisation

After touching record container volumes in July, the Kolkata Dock System(KDS), under the Kolkata Port Trust(KoPT), is now all set to mechanise berth number five at Netaji Subhas Dock(NSD) under public-private partnership(PPP) basis and expects the cargo handling capacity to move up from current 60,000 TEUs per annum to one lakh TEUs per annum post mechanisation.

KDS comprises two dock systems, one at Khidderpore Dock (KPD) and the other being Netaji Subhas Dock (NSD) in Kolkata. KDS handled a record monthly volume of 34,287 twenty equivalent units(TEUs) in July this year, while its April-July container handling increased by 21.57 per cent year-on-year to 1,24,886 TEUs.

Mukul Roy, Union minister of state for Shipping, said recently that the berth-5 at NSD under the KDS should be mechanised on a priority basis.

Senior KoPT officials informed that the matter would be placed before the KoPT Board in its next meeting in September for approval. Once approved, the process would be expedited, the official said adding that KoPT had initially planned to develop the berth from its own internal resources. A request for qualification(RFQ) can be floated within the end of this year. The operator would have to arrange for a round-the-clock mobile harbour crane at the berth right through the year besides all necessary logistical back-up support like installing two yardhandling cranes at the cargo yard.

KoPT is not appointing any external consultant to review the process. Berth number 4 and 8 at KDS were mechanised earlier.

The port has had bad experiences trying to mechanise berths following a PPP mode. The Haldia Dock Bachao Committee(HDBC), an umbrella organisation that comprises five unions controlling employees and workers of the Haldia dock, CITU, INTUC, AITUC and Hind Majdur Samiti, and the Haldia Dock Officers' Forum (HDOF),had earlier protested against KoPT decision to award a berth mechanisation tender to Mumbai-based ABG Infralogistics.

ABG Infralogistics, the L1 or lowest bidder for the job of mechanisation of the berths numbered two and eight at Haldia dock, was issued the Letter of Intent(LoI) by the KoPT Trustee Board on April 25 this year. ABG had quoted Rs 69 per tonne for berth two and Rs 80 per tonne for berth eight, beating Sical Logistics and Tata Steel-Ripley joint venture. The tender was floated in November 2007 and the price bid was opened in April 2008. However, the LoI could not be issued in favour of ABG then in the wake of the opposition from a section of officers as well as members of the Board of Trustees of the port.

This time on, the port has decied to award the tender on a supply-operate-maintain basis to the lowest bidder, but it will collect the tariff from trade directly and pay the quoted charges to the operator. Unlike, the situatio n with ABG where, the operator was collecting the user charges directly from the trade.