Loading…
Union Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways Sarbananda Sonowal inaugurated seven infrastructure projects worth Rs. 427.80 crore at Paradip Port Authority in Odisha.
Capital dredging worth Rs. 352 crore has given the port an 18.5-metre deep-draft capability, letting it handle fully laden Capesize vessels in its inner harbour.
Concession agreements worth Rs. 1,580.36 crore were signed for three mechanisation projects, part of a plan to reach 100% berth mechanisation by 2030 from the present 80%.
Other projects include the Atharbanki Second New Bridge, piped natural gas to 546 residential quarters, and an advanced Vessel Traffic Management and Information System developed with the National Technology Centre for Ports, Waterways and Coasts at IIT Madras.
Paradip Port planted its one-millionth tree, part of a plantation effort begun after the 1999 Super Cyclone.
One of India's 12 major ports, and the first major port on the east coast commissioned after independence. Jawaharlal Nehru laid its foundation stone on 3 January 1962 near the confluence of the Mahanadi and the Bay of Bengal; the Government of India took over its management from the Government of Odisha on 1 June 1965; it was declared the eighth major port of India on 18 April 1966. It handles coal, iron ore, crude oil, fertilizers and containers, and reported about 150 million tonnes of cargo in 2024-25.
The technological arm of the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, set up under the Sagarmala Programme at a cost of about Rs. 77 crore. It provides scientific and modelling support to ports, the Inland Waterways Authority of India and other maritime institutions, and developed the vessel traffic system installed at Paradip.
A statutory body constituted under the MPEDA Act, 1972 under the Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, responsible for developing and promoting marine product exports. It conducted the skill programmes for Odisha's fishing communities around Paradip Fishing Harbour, covering hygienic fish handling, responsible fishing, square-mesh cod-ends, bio-toilets and turtle excluder devices.
A skilling institution under the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways that ran the placement-linked training for 168 unemployed youth from Odisha with Paradip Port Authority's CSR support.
Replaced the Major Port Trusts Act, 1963. It converts each major port's Trust into a leaner Board of Major Port Authority and, under Section 27, empowers the port itself to fix tariffs for its services and for access to port assets including port land - a power that earlier lay with the Tariff Authority for Major Ports. This is why Paradip Port is now styled 'Paradip Port Authority' rather than 'Paradip Port Trust'.
The older general law on ports. Major ports fall under the Union, while the roughly 200 non-major ports are administered by State Maritime Boards.
Olive ridley turtles, which nest on the Odisha coast near Paradip, are protected under Schedule I - the highest level of protection - which is why turtle excluder devices are pushed in trawl fisheries in these waters.
Port-led development - reducing logistics cost for domestic and EXIM cargo by modernising ports and connecting them to their hinterland.
Key: Concept approved by the Union Cabinet on 25 March 2015 under the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways. Four pillars: port modernisation and new port development, port connectivity enhancement, port-linked industrialisation, and coastal community development. NTCPWC at IIT Madras was funded under it.
A long-horizon blueprint for ports, shipping and waterways to 2047.
Key: Launched on 17 October 2023 at the Global Maritime India Summit in Mumbai, building on Maritime India Vision 2030. Its targets include a large expansion of port handling capacity and carbon neutrality at major ports; deep-draft and mechanisation projects of the Paradip kind are its operational expression.
An all-weather greenfield deep-draft major port in Palghar district, Maharashtra.
Key: Approved by the Union Cabinet on 19 June 2024 at a project cost of about Rs. 76,220 crore; it will be India's 13th major port, developed by a special purpose vehicle of Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority (74%) and the Maharashtra Maritime Board (26%), with a natural depth of around 20 metres.
Bring private capital and operating efficiency into berth mechanisation without the port authority financing the terminal itself.
Key: Two of Paradip's three new mechanisation projects - the 5 MTPA South Quay and the 8 MTPA Multipurpose Berth - are on BOT terms, under which the concessionaire builds and operates the terminal for a fixed period and then transfers it back to the port authority.
A ship's draft is the vertical distance between the waterline and the bottom of the hull, and it grows as the ship is loaded. A port can only accept a vessel whose loaded draft is less than the depth available at its channel and berths, so a shallow port either turns big ships away or takes them only part-loaded - which means the same cargo needs more voyages and costs more per tonne. Capital dredging that takes Paradip to 18.5 metres lets fully laden Capesize vessels enter the inner harbour. Capesize bulk carriers are the largest dry-bulk class, generally above 150,000 deadweight tonnage, too big for the Panama Canal and historically routed around the Cape of Good Hope - which is where the name comes from. Because bulk shipping cost per tonne falls sharply with vessel size, draft is among the biggest determinants of a bulk port's competitiveness, and it is also why berth mechanisation matters alongside it: a bigger ship saves nothing if it then sits at berth for days being unloaded by grab and truck.
Simple Analogy: Draft is the height limit on a road tunnel. Raise it and the largest lorries can finally take the shortest route fully loaded, instead of splitting the load into several smaller trips.
Paradip lies in Jagatsinghpur district on Odisha's coast, near where the Mahanadi meets the Bay of Bengal, roughly 125 km from Bhubaneswar. It anchors the Mahanadi delta industrial belt and sits along the stretch of the Odisha coast that hosts the world's largest olive ridley nesting grounds - Gahirmatha, within the Bhitarkanika ecosystem, together with the Devi river mouth and Rushikulya rookeries. The 1999 Super Cyclone, which struck this coast, is the reason the port's plantation drive began.
A TED is a grid fitted into a trawl net that lets shrimp pass through while allowing turtles to escape. MPEDA, working with ICAR-Central Institute of Fisheries Technology, has designed an indigenous TED, and the push for adoption is driven both by olive ridley conservation on the Odisha coast and by the certification requirements of shrimp export markets.
The cyclone that struck the Odisha coast in October 1999 prompted the port's plantation programme and, more broadly, drove India's shift to a preparedness-based disaster management architecture that culminated in the Disaster Management Act, 2005 and the NDMA.
India has 12 major ports administered by the Union under the Major Port Authorities Act, 2021, with Vadhavan approved as the 13th; the roughly 200 non-major ports come under State Maritime Boards. Paradip, Visakhapatnam, Chennai, Kamarajar (Ennore), V.O. Chidambaranar (Tuticorin) and Kolkata (Syama Prasad Mookerjee) are the east-coast majors.
The Automatic Identification System is a transponder-based system that broadcasts a ship's identity, position and course; combining it with radar, CCTV and oil-spill sensors is what turns a signal station into a vessel traffic management system, of the kind now installed at Paradip.
GS Paper 3 > Infrastructure > Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways
Static GK > Ports of India
General Awareness > Transport Infrastructure
Ports and the Sagarmala framework appear regularly in GS Paper 3 infrastructure questions and in SSC/Railway static geography.
The vertical distance from the waterline to the lowest point of a ship's hull; a port's available depth must exceed a vessel's loaded draft for it to berth fully laden.
The largest class of dry-bulk carrier, generally above 150,000 DWT, too large for the Panama Canal and historically routed around the Cape of Good Hope.
Dredging that deepens or widens a channel beyond its original design depth, as against maintenance dredging, which only removes accumulated silt.
Million tonnes per annum - the standard measure of a berth's or terminal's cargo handling capacity.
A grid fitted in a trawl net that allows sea turtles to escape while retaining shrimp, now required in Indian mechanised trawl fisheries.