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Kolkata: With the onset of the monsoon in Mumbai, the problem of congestion has returned to haunt Jawaharlal Nehru port, and with full fury.
All the three container terminals are choked with boxes.
According to one estimate, the collective yard pendency has crossed 50,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) and the ICD pendency is 9,000.
Of this, nearly 67 per cent comprises boxes bound for New Delhi and the National Capital region.
Hamburg Sud, operating EPIC service between Europe-West Asia-India-Pakistan, has informed its customers that it will route via Mundra port the cargo bound for Ahmedabad, Delhi (ICD Tughlakabad, Dadri and Loni), Jaipur, Jodhpur and Ludhiana.
Safmarine has announced diversion of all North-India bound boxes to Pipavav port “to provide better transit time to customers in North Indian ICDs.” Maersk and CMA CGM too are, it is learnt, planning to shift their North India bound traffic from GTI to Pipavav.
Inquiries reveal that the rakes from Pipavav will converge with rakes from Mundra at Palanpur for onward journey to Delhi.
The density of traffic on the broad gauge route is already heavy.
Delay in transfer
There is, however, another problem. Due to railway bottlenecks outside Delhi, there will be a delay in the transfer of rakes into the terminals.
Several container lines are believed to be mulling slapping compensatory rates for the extra costs they are incurring now.
Source: The Hindu Business Line
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