Union Shipping Minister Sarbananda Sonowal to visit Deendayal Port Trust today

GANDHIDHAM :  Hon’ble Union Minister of Ports, Shipping & Waterways and AYUSH, Shri Sarbananda Sonowal will visit Deendayal Port Trust on 18-19 October to lay the foundation stone for many important projects to Strengthen the capacity of the port.

On the first day of his visit on 18th October, the Port Trust management will make a presentation on DPT to the Hon’ble Minister after which he will hold a meeting with the port stake holders.

Shri Sonowal will lay the foundation stone for many important projects on Tuesday,19th October to strengthen Port capacity. The capacity enhancement projects includes 1) Augmentation of liquid cargo handling capacity by revamping the existing pipeline network of oil jetty area at Kandla, 2) Construction of oil jetty No 8 at Old Kandla, 3) Construction of dome shaped storage sheds inside cargo jetty area, 4) Development of parking plaza for pre-checking of vehicles outside cargo jetty area

The foundation stone laying ceremony for the above projects will also be graced by few eminent personalities which includes Dr Nimaben Acharya, Hon’ble Speaker, Gujarat Vidhansabha, Shri Vinodbhai Chavda, Member of Parliament, Kachchh, Smt Maltiben Maheshwari, MLA, Gandhidham, Kachchh, Shri Sanjay Mehta, IFS, Chairman, DPT and Shri Nandeesh Shukla, IRTS, Deputy Chairman, DPT.

After the foundation stone laying ceremony of various projects on 19th October, Shri Sonowal will meet the trade unions of the port and inspect the navigational channel, waterfront and port facilities as well as visit the cargo jetty No 16 followed by Kandla International Container Terminal, inspection of VTMS facilities and salt pan lands.

Shri Sonowal will also inaugurate the lighthouse at Rawalpir, Mandvi on 20 October.

Meanwhile, Deendayal Port Trust (DPT) also rolls out an ambitious set of pearls of infrastructure projects under PM Gati Shakti – National Master Plan.

Deendayal Port is No.1 Major Port in India, and has been grossing highest traffic throughput amongst all major ports consecutively for the last 14 Years. Last year despite, the covid scare it could amass a traffic of 117.56 MMT, highest amongst all major ports.

The port has a multipronged strategy in purview of the Maritime Vision 2030 which was devised under the august leadership of Hon’ble Prime Minister and Hon’ble Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways. Under the strategy there are 6 basic areas where the port is focusing on and is aiming to achieve 200 MMTPA of cargo by 2029-30.

The focus area include: Cargo and Productivity improvement, Landlord Port Development, Port Led Industrialization, Coastal Shipping and Ro-Ro, Ro- Pax expansion, Ease of Doing Business and Cost of Doing Business improvement, and Green and Safe Port.

There are multitude of projects planned under different focus areas and the port is working diligently to achieve its targets. The ministry has an ambitious Sagarmala programme and other initiatives like Asset Monetization Plan, Gati Shakti- National Master Plan, National Infrastructure Pipeline etc. and the port has a no. of projects under these programmes.

Under Sagarmala, the port has 21 projects worth 4300 Crores out of which 6 projects worth 465 Crores have already been completed. Another initiative of the Govt. of India is Gati Shakti – National Master Plan, under which the port has 10 projects worth 2552 Crores which are under implementation.

The major projects under Gati Shakti are Augmentation of Pipeline Network at Oil Jetty area in Kandla, SBM expansion at Vadinar, Oil Jetty Cum Bunkering Terminal at Kandla, Construction of 5 Oil Jetties: OJ 7,8,9,10 and 11, Smart Industrial Port City Project and Mechanization of Cargo berth no 14. The port expects huge investment in many of these projects from the private sector as they are to be implemented in the public private partnership model. This will help in boosting EXIM trade thus help in increasing the GDP of the economy.

The port is also implementing connectivity projects belonging to rail, road and Ro- Ro/Ro Pax. The Ro Ro Ro Pax Service from Hazira to Ghogha was inaugurated by the hon’ble Prime Minister, and DPT helped in implementation of the project under the guidance of MoPS&W. Carrying it forward the port is developing Ro-Ro Pax facilities worth 383 Crores at Hazira, Pipavaw and Muldwarka under the purview of Sagarmala.

Overall, the port is trying to fulfil the vision of the Hon’ble Prime minister and Hon’ble Minister of Ports, shipping and waterways. The port is also putting efforts to expedite all the infrastructure projects keeping well in view that the Prime Minister is launching the first ever National Infrastructure Masterplan, Pradhan Mantri Gati Shakti on Wednesday, 13th October 2021, which is going to bring together 16 Ministries, including seven core infrastructure sectors, on one platform to synergize project planning across stakeholder ministries.