The Centres move to create an all-encompassing regulator for ports has been opposed by the maritime states. They are of the view that such a move is tantamount to interfering with the functioning of minor ports that come under the jurisdiction of the state governments. The proposed Port Regulatory Authority will have powers to fix tariffs at minor ports,transfer employees,decide on land utilisation policies and ensure that they follow a transparent bidding process. The authority has been envisaged under the Ports Regulatory Authority Bill drafted by the Ministry of Shipping. All the maritime states have opposed the Bill stating that it amounts to usurping the powers of state governments when it comes to dealing with land related issues. Moreover,they say that in a free market economy minor ports should be given complete freedom to fix tariffs and compete with major ports, a senior government official associated with the process said. Once the Bill is enacted,state governments will be forced to set up state ports regulatory authorities which shall act upon the principles,approach and methodology specified by the major ports regulatory authority at the Centre. Further,the tariff guidelines set by the major ports regulatory authority will contain broad norms for different components of operations and expenditure to be considered in determining rates,methodology to determine rates,periodicity of rates revision,and other conditions governing provision of services. Currently,tariffs are fixed on an ad hoc basis,the official added. Another reason of contention between the Centre and state governments is that once this policy is enforced,states will be forced to set up grievance redressal mechanisms,where port facility stakeholders can contest the logic of setting certain types of tariffs. Currently,grievances are taken by private parties straight to court in most states, the official said. Currently,the Centre fixes tariffs of major ports through the Tariff Authority on Major Ports (TAMP),which has no jurisdiction over minor ports. This has lead to a lot of price competition with traffic getting diverted from major ports to nearby minor ports in the same state which usually adopts predatory pricing. Once the port regulatory authority is formed TAMP will be dissolved. There are 13 major ports and over 180 minor ports in the country. Gujarat,which accounts for almost 70 per cent of all minor port traffic has vehemently opposed the Bill. In the coming decade minor ports are expected to overtake major ports handling 1,280 million tonne of traffic by 2019-20 against 1,214 million tonne for major ports. In terms of capacity,minor ports are likely to have a capacity of 1,670 million tonnes by 2020.
