The Hindu Business Line : Delinking Haldia dock from Kolkata Port Trust

This is not for the first time that the issue of delinking Haldia from the Kolkata Port Trust has come up for a review. All expert committees set up to look into the issue have strongly opposed such a move.

LAST September, the Union Shipping Ministry constituted a five-member committee under the Director-General of Shipping to examine the scope of delinking Haldia dock from the Kolkata Port Trust (KoPT) and reconstituting it into a separate port. The other members of the committee are Mr R. R. Sinha, former Deputy Chairman of the Mumbai Port Trust; Mr M. A. Bhaskarachar, Deputy Chairman of the KoPT in charge of the Kolkata Dock System; Mr M. L. Meena, Deputy Chairman of the KoPT in charge of Haldia dock; and Mr S. Sen, Secretary, Department of Commerce and Industry, Government of West Bengal. The committee was asked to submit its report within six months. The report is due for submission, though it is not known yet if the report is ready.

This is not for the first time that the issue of delinking Haldia from KoPT has come up for a review. From the time this issue has been raised, all expert committees set up earlier to look into the issue have strongly opposed such a move. Thus, the Mukherji-Subramanian Committee set up by the Centre in 1975-76 recommended that the two dock systems should be placed under one Trust body. The Union Government accepted it. Subsequently, the Gopalan-Bhatikar Committee also opposed delinking. Now for the third time a committee has been constituted for the same purpose. Intriguingly, after nearly three decades of the establishment of the Haldia as a separate dock system under the KoPT.

Reports have it that three issues prompted the Ministry for a fresh review of the delinking issue. First, Haldia dock does not have under it any river pilot as the pilots are under the control of the port's head office located in Kolkata. Second, although Haldia is much closer to the Sandheads than Kolkata Dock System, the marine charges for both the dock systems is the same. Finally, the Deputy Chairman in charge of Haldia dock is not vested with sufficient powers.

Now let us take the last point first. It is not correct to say that the Deputy Chairman in charge of Haldia dock does not have enough powers. Quite opposite is the truth. The Shipping Ministry in a letter dated June 15,1997, delegated the powers of the Chairman to the Deputy Chairman of Haldia dock save in matters relating to policy decisions. Such powers have not been conferred on Deputy Chairmen of any other port, not even to the Deputy Chairman in charge of the Kolkata Dock System.

If the users of the Haldia dock are required to shuttle between Kolkata and Haldia, it is not because the port's head office is located at Kolkata but because of other reasons. The Customs does not have a full-fledged set-up at Haldia. Similarly, shipping companies, clearing and forwarding agents, surveyors and others all operate from Kolkata, maintaining small offices at Haldia. One fails to understand how declaring Haldia dock a separate port will solve this problem. In the case of Jawaharlal Nehru port, it has not. The various agencies continue to operate from Mumbai.

Also, contrary to general perception, even among a section of the bureaucracy, the Jawaharlal Nehru port (then Nhava Sheva port) was conceived in 1980 not as part of the Mumbai port but as a separate port and accordingly Nhava Sheva Port Trust was constituted in May 1982 and the construction of the port started under direct supervision of the then Ministry of Shipping and Transport.

Next, the marine related charges are for maintenance of the fairway for safe navigation. The bulk of the expenditure incurred by the KoPT in this regard relates to activities in the estuary, that is, around Haldia and further down the river. The pilotage charge is based on the size of the vessel. The vessels calling at Haldia are generally larger, requiring greater skill in handling them and therefore engagement of the senior pilots. This is not true of the Kolkata Dock System where usually much smaller ships call because of the poor navigability of the Hooghly river. The distance of Haldia/KDS from pilot boarding/disembarking points is of little consequence when GRT/km is considered. Besides, the power to fix port tariffs is vested with the Tariff Authority for Major Ports, not with the Board of Trustees, nor even the Chairman.

Finally, the non-availability of pilots at Haldia: There are posts of pilots at Haldia. These posts were always there and duly filled. However, most of the pilots recruited for Haldia left the job subsequently, thus reducing the strength. The Haldia dock authorities, therefore, had no other option but to fall back upon the Kolkata-based pilots for ship movement to and from the dock. As per the Major Port Trust Act, the Shipping Ministry has the powers to create posts of officers at the middle-level and above.Kolkata port has been having various problems for over 100 years. Since 1881, the Centre gradually washed its hands off certain duties and responsibilities and passed them on to the port authorities. For example, the maintenance of the navigability of the channel in the Hooghly river was originally handled by the government but it was gradually passed on to the Commissioners of the Port of Calcutta. As a result, the light-houses, light ships, hydrographic survey, navigational buoys, earlier maintained by the Centre, became responsibility of the port authorities.

With effect from May 1948, the Government of India transferred the 282-year-old pilot service along the 127-nautical-mile stretch of the Hooghly river to the Calcutta port. This was in addition to harbour pilots already employed by the port authorities. From April 1948, the port had to absorb about 10,000 cargo handling workers employed by Bird & Company since 1893.

In 1976-77, the move to reduce the strength of the idle dock workers through a retirement scheme had to be abandoned at the instance of the Centre. The government also forced the port to absorb the surplus staff of IGRSN & Co, a private river service company, after its nationalisation. The major ports including Calcutta switched to the pension scheme as per the Union Government order. Now, the number of pensioners is close to 30,000 while the strength of the workforce is about 8,000 and the same government is blaming the port authorities for the rising pensioners' liability. Thus various policy decisions of the Central Government only multiplied the problems facing the port.

Added to it were various other factors like the change in cargo pattern, packaging and handling system, decline in traffic volume due to the deteriorating condition of the river, technology changes in the maritime industry, particularly the advent of containerisation. The surplus marine crew had to be paid 50-55 per cent overtime. As a cumulative effect of all this, Calcutta port lost its competitiveness. The proposed delinking, if implemented, will drive the last nail into the coffin.

(The author is Convenor, Calcutta Port Officer Pensioners' Cell.)