Union Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari has said there will be no privatisation or retrenchment of workers in the port sector upon corporatisation of major ports.

The Minister gave the assurance during talks with representatives of five major federations of port and dock workers in Mumbai in the wake of the strike notice issued by them.

Need to modernise

According to him, there will be no change in terms and conditions of the present employees and their service conditions and benefits would be fully protected.

Highlighting the dwindling share of cargo traffic in major ports from around 90 per cent in the 90s to 57 per cent in the current year, the Minister emphasised the need to modernise and improve the functioning of ports to stay in the reckoning in a competitive world. Corporatisation of major ports would lead to more opportunities, he added. Given the limitations of the present port trust model to respond to market challenges, Gadkari said the government has proposed corporatisation to allow ports to modernise quickly, attract investments and reach international standards in terms of operational efficiency.

Explaining the constraints imposed by the provisions of the Major Port Trusts Act, he cited the inability of the port trusts to raise financial resources from the market and the need to take government approval under provisions of the MPT Act, 1963.

The Government had taken several initiatives to increase the flexibility and to speed up decision making in major port trusts.

This included delegation of enhanced powers including the power to sanction projects up to ₹200 crore and new guidelines to TAMP which empower Port Trusts to fix tariffs subject to an overall annual revenue requirement ceiling.

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