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Amit Mitra

Mumbai , Dec 9

CONGESTION is once again raring its head at Nhava Seva International Container Terminal (NSICT) at Jawaharlal Nehru port, prompting the terminal operator, P&O Ports India, to dash off a letter to the Shipping Ministry, seeking urgent decongestion measures such as supply of more rakes by Container Corporation of India (Concor).

According to sources, NSICT has pointed out that the pace of evacuation of cargo to the different inland container depots (ICD) has not been able to keep pace with the surge in imports during the last few months. The pendency of such consignments has bloated up from 3,257 TEUs as of October 1 to 4,706 TEUs on November 1. It, however, fell to 3,222 TEUs on December 1.

"The fall in pendency in December was not due to quicker cargo evacuation, but due to holidays in West Asia, which slowed down shipments. In fact, we were expecting the pendency to touch the 7,000-TEU mark had there been no slow down in shipments from West Asia," according to an NSICT official.

NSICT fears that with the holidays over, there is once again going to be a surge in imports, which could further choke the terminal and paralyse terminal operations.

According to reports, Concor has been able to deploy 195 trains to NSICT and JNPT since November 19. "This is just not enough to brook the usual surge in imports that is expected during the December to January period. And this means that the situation would mirror the same status that was experienced during the peak of the congestion earlier this year," sources close to NSICT said.

According to reports, the yards at the terminal are beginning to reach a level of 15,000 TEUs, as against the normal level of 10,000 TEUs. "If some measures are not taken immediately, the terminal would face a severe congestion crisis in the coming months," the sources said.

Congestion has been dogging the terminal since May this year, prompting the terminal operator to take several extreme measures such as asking shipping lines to "seriously consider" moving their ICD boxes by road and cut down their ICD imports by 50 per cent. In fact, an incremental cargo of about 5 lakh TEUs that should have moved through JNPT in the current fiscal will have to find alternative gateways, shipping analysts say.

The shippers had been worst hit a few months ago when the congestion had peaked-- the terminal operator was forced to impose stiff restrictions on opening of gates, discourage booking of import boxes for ICD destinations and shut out export boxes in a desperate attempt to ease the congestion. In fact, in the first 10 days of July, the export gate was closed for nine days, with almost every vessel facing substantial shut outs or insufficient time slot for loading.

"A shutout box involves payment of $46.03 per TEU, beside a ground rent of $3.25 per TEU per day by the shippers," according to a representative of the Western India Shippers Association.

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