The Hindu : Work on Sethu project may begin next year: Minister

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jun 17, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

Work on Sethu project may begin next year: Minister

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI June 16 . The Centre is committed to implementing the Sethusamudram project and the work is likely to begin in the next financial year, the Union Minister of Shipping, Vedprakash P. Goyal, said here today.

Addressing mediapersons here, the Minister said a techno-economic feasibility study was conducted by the National Environment and Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), Nagpur, and the project report was expected before the end of the current financial year.

Owing to objections by the Environmental Ministry, the project could not take off.

The Shipping Ministry wanted to get clearance at the project report stage itself so that it was not delayed any further.

He assured there was no financial crunch in taking up the project.

He said no serious thought was given to the project previously.

But this time the Centre was firm on implementing the project, as it would help ships ply between the east and western coasts without touching the Colombo port, thereby saving a lot of time and fuel, besides improving the international traffic through the Indian ports.

He denied that the project was not taking off due to pressure from Sri Lanka on the ground that its implementation would adversely affect its traffic in the Colombo Port.

The project was well within Indian waters, he added.

The Minister, who earlier held discussions with port users on reducing costs and improving efficiency in operations, said in the current global scenario, it was difficult to attract foreign liners unless rates were competitive in the Indian ports. The Minister said he had planned a series of meetings with port users and board members of various ports.

As boards of major ports were autonomous bodies, they were independent to take decisions up to a limit of Rs. 100 crores.

He wanted them to use their discretionary powers to increase the ports' efficiency.

Steps were being taken to set up a transhipment port near Vallarpadam in Cochin to receive large ships, he said.

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