KOLKATA: Officers of the Kolkata Port Trust (KoPT) are keeping their fingers crossed. Four days from now, they will get to know whether the port will be allowed to carry out transloading operations at Kanika Sands, off the Odisha coast. The future of Haldia Dock Complex (HDC) depends on this.
With falling draught in the navigation channel outside HDC, the port management was forced to look for other options to increase revenue. One of these was to transload cargo from large vessels to barges at certain locations and bring them to Haldia. The Sandheads, which falls within KoPT's jurisdiction, is one such location. In fact, cargo has been transloaded on to barges and brought to Haldia from the Sandheads.
However, this location suffers from a problem.
"We had to look for another location where lighterage operations can be conducted throughout the year. Kanika Sands is one such location which isn't too far from Haldia. KoPT moved this proposal to the Ministry of Shipping and even got it cleared a couple of years ago. However, the Odisha government was not too keen to allow KoPT to operate so close to its north-eastern coastline as there are private ports operating there. The Odisha government moved the Supreme Court, seeking a reversal of the ministry's order that granted clearance to KoPT," an official said.
After several hearings, the court urged the Centre to convene a meeting with officials from KoPT and the Government of Odisha and find a solution to the problem. The meeting will be held was to be held on Friday but has now been postponed on Tuesday. KoPT officials are hopeful that they would be able to convince the Odisha government that its interests won't suffer if lighterage operations are carried out at Kanika Sands.
"We hope to arrive at a solution in this meeting. If this happens, all parties will move court and submit that the matter has been sorted out," KoPT chairman RPS Kahlon had said a few days ago.
"Lighterage operations are essential for the future of HDC. As draught has fallen, large vessels can't enter the port confines with capacity loads. Importers, on the other hand, want to bring in cargo in larger volumes as this is economical. The only option left with KoPT is to bring in cape-sized vessels to deep-draughted locations like the Sandheads and transload cargo on to barges. In this way, the ships are also not delayed," the official added.
Source:-timesofindia.indiatimes.com
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