By Our Correspondent
NEW DELHI/BHUBANESWAR: Union Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways, Shri Sarbananda Sonowal in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday said, a total of 7 projects worth Rs Rs 5,528.12 Crore to be implemented in Odisha under PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan in phased manner.
PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan (NMP) is a transformative approach for integrated and holistic planning across concerned Ministries/Departments to improve multimodal connectivity, logistics efficiency and to address critical infrastructure gaps for seamless movement of people and goods, with focus on minimising disruptions and ensuring timely completion of projects.
The NMP aims at facilitating development of multi-modal connectivity infrastructure to various economic zones including Ports and shipping sector. 101 number of projects in respect of Ports and Shipping have so far been identified under PM Gati Shakti initiative worth Rs. 60,872 Crores for implementation. Out of these, 13 projects worth Rs. 4,423 Crore have been completed. The statewise list of projects for Ports and shipping sector is annexed.
For enhanced capital expenditure by States for infrastructure development, the Ministry of Finance, Department of Expenditure through part-II(for PM-Gati Shakti related expenditure) of the “Scheme for Special Assistance to States for Capital Investment for 2022-23” has made an additional provision of Rs. 5000 crores for disbursement among the States as long term loans at a zero interest rate.
Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways has undertaken various initiatives for ease of doing business. Incentives such as Model Concession Agreement, flexibility to concessioners, New tariff guidelines etc have been issued which allows improvement in port performance at Major Ports. However, Under PM Gati Shakti there is no envisaged structure related to additional incentives to any high performing port.
