Ports, the gateways to India's International trade by sea handle
over 90% of foreign trade. There are 12 Major Ports & 187
Minor/Intermediate ports along the 7,517 kms long coast line of
the country. There are 12 Major Ports in the country viz. Kolkata
(including Haldia), Paradip, Visakhapatnam, Chennai, Ennore and
Tuticorin on the East Coast and Cochin, New Mangalore, Mormugao,
Jawaharlal Nehru, Mumbai and Kandla on the West Coast. All the
Major Ports are administered by Port Trusts which are autonomous
bodies except for the newly constructed Ennore Port which is run
by a company named Ennore Port Limited registered under Companies
96 Act, 1956. There are two subordinate offices under Ports Wing
namely Andaman Lakshdweep Harbour Works (ALHW) and Minor Port
Survey Organisation (MPSO). The ALHW is entrusted with the responsibility
of formulating and implementing the programme for providing port
and harbour facilities in A&N Islands and Lakshdweep Islands.
The MPSO carries out the task of Hydrographic Surveys in Minor
& Major Ports and Inland Waterways. There are two training
institutes namely National Institute of Port Management and Indian
Institute of Port Management who are engaged in providing training,
consultancy and research in the Port, Shipping and related sectors.
They have been registered as Autonomous Societies.
In addition to 12 major ports as listed above there are 187
ports which are under the jurisdiction of respective State Governments.
These ports handled around 26% of the total maritime traffic
in 2005-06.
The Major Ports handled a total traffic of 344.8 million tones
during the financial 2003 04 and 276 million tones in the Financial
Year 2004-05 in the period of April to December, 2004.
The major ports continued the trend of excess capacity as compared
to the traffic handled which began in 2001. The aggregate capacity
of the major ports has been 389.50 million tones per annum as
compared to 344.80 million tones handled during 2003-04.
The major performance indicators for the ports have improved
during the year as the average turn around time has improved
from 3.48 days during 2003 to 3.38 days during 2004. Similarly,
average output per ship berth day for all Major Ports taken
together has improved from 8590 tonnes to 8838 tonnes.
