There is one crying need of the fair city of Thiruvananthapuram that has been hanging fire ever since I can recollect. Calls for and moves to construct a port for the city have been going on even longer I am sure. However, nothing has materialized beyond grandiose plans and a few ambitious signboards announcing various "projects" which I often glimpse as I make an occasional trip to Kovalam. Now as the State Government is on the threshold of another attempt at building the port, let us take a look at what makes this project so significant not just to Thiruvananthapuram or Kerala, but to our whole country.

A feature that almost every port in India lacks is deep draft - the depth inside their harbours that is essential if large ships are to dock. In fact, there is no true deep-water port in India currently if we assume a permissible draft of about 20 metres as the qualification. Simple economics dictates that bigger ships can carry cargo at much cheaper rates than smaller ones. This is especially true in case of crude oil and containers. Giant supertankers can bring in crude at much lower rates than currently possible in India while container "mother ships" carry containers at rates that are cheaper than the coastal carriers found in Indian ports today. However, no Indian port can accommodate a supertanker. Some ports like Mumbai and Kakinada can accommodate container carriers but are hard pressed to dock the biggest of these. Currently, containers bound for India are trans-shipped from big carriers to smaller vessels mainly at Colombo, which handles more container traffic than most of the major Indian ports combined. Efforts are underway to improve the situation. Several harbours are being deepened and new projects like the Vallarpadam Container Trans-shipment Terminal in Kochi are taking shape.

But all these require massive capital dredging as well as intensive maintenance dredging, both of which are very expensive. Import of crude oil by supertankers and subsequent trans-shipment to smaller ships is currently taking place at locations like Sandheads, near Kolkata and at Vishakhapatanam. However, most of these efforts are conducted out at sea, and hence are vulnerable to the vagaries of the weather, slow and clumsy. Thus, we see that the lack of deep draft ports can turn out to be a major bottleneck in the economic development of the nation.

However there is a solution on the horizon. There is a location for a port at the southern tip of the sub-continent which could be a solution to all this. Near Thiruvananthapuram, is a sleepy fishing village called Vizhinjam. It already possesses a rudimentary fishing harbour. But, the significance of this site lies in the fact that it possesses a natural harbour unrivalled in its draft.

Studies conducted at Vizhinjam have shown that there is a natural depth of up to 23 metres here. A port constructed here could easily accommodate ships with displacements of up to 300,000 tons, with little or no dredging. Compare this with the fact that most of the current ports are hard pressed to accommodate ships of even 200,000 tons even after massive dredging. A comparatively scant 5-6 metres of dredging at Vizhinjam means that it could accommodate even the biggest ship in the world, with a whopping displacement of more than 564,000 tons! Basically this means that the Vizhinjam port can handle supertankers and the biggest container mother ships with ease. That is not all, this site is possibly closer to the main international shipping lanes than any other current port in India, which makes it all the more cheaper for ships to call here. This also opens up avenues for bunkering (re-fueling) of ships as well as ship-repair. Between three and six container berths here could serve as a starting point for an international trans-shipment hub. Consider that Colombo alone currently handles over 1.5 million containers a year, and it has actually run out of capacity! The container traffic into and out of Indian ports has sharply increased to over 2.5 million units today. The trans-shipment market is clear and wide open. On the crude transshipment front, a land based transshipment facility with a storage complex and docking piers, will reduce turn around time for ships as well result in a significant fall in the import price of crude passing through here. We also have to remember that crude oil is India's single biggest import and that the Vizhinjam site lies very close to the main Persian Gulf - Far East shipping lanes used by most supertankers. Finally, Vizhinjam has yet another ace up its sleeve in the fact that it requires very little maintenance dredging, due to its sheltered location. Similarly, unlike East coast ports or those in Gujarat, the Kerala coast suffers comparatively little disruption from cyclone activity.

In addition to the obvious benefits stated above, a slightly more farsighted approach can envision the construction of a major dry dock facility inside the harbour to construct deep draft ships as well as to provide repair facilities to ships passing by on the shipping lanes. The biggest Indian shipyard today has a maximum ship building capacity of less than 150,000 tons. This cannot cater to the need of the domestic shipping industry nor tap into the huge international demand for ships. Most of the major domestic orders actually flow to foreign shipbuilders, usually in Korea. The shipbuilding industry can look forward to a solid future as shipping capacity expands and old ships are replaced. A case in point would be the fact that in the next few years, millions of tons of shipping will have to be built as single hulled tankers are replaced by double-hulled ones, in line with maritime regulations. Additionally, a coal fired thermal power station with coal import facilities can also be envisaged, as done in Ennore. This would help solve Kerala's current power crisis.

Why all this hasn't happened already, is a rather interesting question. Not that Vizhinjam is unknown to the concerned authorities. The State Government has been juggling around with the project for decades now. It has been all talk and plans, but precious little action. A few years ago, a Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) agreement was signed with a private company but nothing transpired. However, recently interest seems to have been rekindled in the project. A project study has been completed and the State Government claims that global tenders will soon be called for a BOT venture for the port. An investment of atleast Rs 3000 crores will be required while overall project completion time will be about 3 years. Such a venture will require a range of clearances from the Central and State Governments but it seems both of them are finally waking up to reality and throwing their weight behind the project. The State Government has announced in recent days that it plans to hold a Global Investor Meet to rope in private developers for the project. However, it is often claimed that powerful lobby groups often impede the progress of the project, as they fear it would erode the revenue of their own port operations. Let us hope at least this time, the project takes off. It is one development which could make a very significant contribution to India's economic progress in the coming years.