Environmental concerns to cargo movement, big challenges for 3 new ports

The NDA government's three new major ports have been delayed owing to local opposition, environmental concerns, and cargo movement-related hurdles. 

The Union shipping ministry had announced setting up three major ports in 2016.

While the proposed Enayam port in Tamil Nadu has been delayed due to opposition from fishermen, the one proposed at Wadhwan, Gujarat, needs a disaster management study. The site for the proposed port in Wadhwan is in the vicinity of the Tarapur atomic plant. 

The third one, at Sagar in West Bengal, struggles with issues of cargo landing at the terminal.

It costs Rs 10-12 billion to build a major port, which comes up in phases.

On July 2016, the Union Cabinet approved setting up a major port at Enayam. 

As soon as the approval was granted, the proposed project faced opposition from the local fishermen community over loss of livelihood. 

“The local church has backed the protests since the port will hamper fishing and affect the lives of local fishermen,” said an official in the know.  

The Centre has decided to move the project 7-8 km downstream and a fresh detailed project report has been prepared.

The ministry of shipping has asked V.O. Chidambaranar Port (VOCT), earlier known as Tuticorin port, in the vicinity to do the traffic assessment for the new port. 

According to the VOCT website, the traffic handled at the port till August was 14 million tonnes, which included importing thermal and industrial coal and exporting cement and container traffic. 

“We are evaluating whether there would be enough traffic for a new port,” a shipping ministry official said.

Wadhwan port, on the Maharashtra-Gujarat border, has been delayed owing to environmental issues raised by the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) and Nuclear Power Corporation of India. The proposed port, even though it is more than 500 km from the Tarapur atomic power station, falls in its outer periphery. 

“We have been asked to undertake a few studies by including one on disaster management before we go ahead with the port. Since we are not equipped to conduct such studies ourselves, we have engaged the Pune-based Central Water and Power Research Station for this,” the official said.

Sagar port’s viability was re-examined after the West Bengal government selected Tajpur as the site for it. 

It is being developed as a major port by Bhor Sagar Port, a special purpose vehicle (SPV) formed by the Kolkata Port Trust and the state government as a 74:26 joint venture.

“The bridge the central government is building is on land that falls on a narrow road, on both sides of which commercial activities take place. Therefore, only liquid cargo would be moved from the port,” the official quoted above said.

According to Vijay Chibber, a former senior official in the shipping ministry, “two (Enayam and Wadhwan) were flights of fancy. Sagar was a serious proposal. The reason behind the proposal to develop Sagar was to get a deeper draft port as Haldia port did not have a deep draft.”

A deep draft enables seamless movements of large vessels and since Sagar is an island, deeper digging would have been possible.

“Another major port in West Bengal was Kolkata but it had a severe silting issue and every year approximately Rs 3 billion is paid to Dredging Corporation of India for de-silting the port,” Chibber said.