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A few days after Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee complained about the lack of dredging drying up the ports of the state, it came to the fore that the Narendra Modi-government has slashed the dredging subsidy for the Kolkata Port Trust (KoPT) to a new low in recent years.
The KoPT is expected to get Rs 162 crore from the Centre for dredging this fiscal against Rs 276 crore last year, reflecting a 41 per cent decline in allocation. The cutback will look far worse if the port\’s actual dredging cost of Rs 425 crore for 2015-16 is taken into consideration.
However, KoPT chairman M.T. Krishna Babu said that the initial success of the Eden channel, a new passage to Haldia Dock on the Hooghly river, would reduce the port’s financial burden.
“We want to keep the expense at Rs 250-300 crore as the Eden channel will not require much dredging,” he said, indicating that the KoPT can make do with a lower subsidy from the Centre. However, it may be too early to conclude anything.
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