Shipping ministry plans second major port in state

A second major port on the lines of Kandla could soon take shape in Gujarat. The Union Ministry of Shipping has formed a committee to explore the possibility of setting up another major port in the state.

For this purpose, the Union Ministry has requested the state government to nominate a member of the committee, said Union Minister of State for Shipping Milind Deora during his visit to the Kandla Port on Monday.

This committee will explore locations at which this second major port could come up, said officials of the Kandla Port Trust (KPT). Gujarat already has one major and over 20 minor ports including Mundra, Pipavav, Okha, Dahej, Hazira and others.

Officials of the nodal agency for port development in the state, Gujarat Martime Board (GMB), said the Union Ministry has approached the state on the issue and the talks for setting up a second major port in the state has been going on since the last couple of years.

Meanwhile, the country's largest major port, Kandla, is also constructing a Rs 1,060-crore dry bulk terminal at Tuna (having a capacity of 14.11 million tonnes per annum) which is being developed as a satellite port in the Gulf of Kutch.

The KPT is itself in the process of building four multi-purpose cargo berths at Kandla to help it cross 100 million tonne of cargo by 2012-13. In the last financial year (2011-12), Kandla clocked 82.5 million tonne per annum of cargo.

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