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Centre for cap on Hooghly dredging reimbursement cost

Santanu Sanyal

KOLKATA, June 1

THE Union Government is believed to be in favour of putting a cap on the reimbursement of the maintenance dredging cost in the Hooghly river.

It appears the Public Investment Board (PIB) wants a cap of 15 million cubic metres (cum) on the annual volume of dredging; but a section of the Shipping Ministry favours a cap in terms of the reimbursement amount and set it at Rs 200 crore annually.

This has caused concern to the CPT authorities. For the past few years, the volume of maintenance dredging in the Hooghly has been of the order of 20 million cum annually on an average, the cost being in excess of Rs 300 crore.

The targetted dredging volume for 2001-02 has been set at 18 million cum and the cost estimate at Rs 350 crore.

CPT, it is learnt, is considering renegotiation of rates with the Dredging Corporation of India in the wake of the present line of thinking of the Government. The DCI's basic rate is about Rs 150 per cum of dredging. However, together with escalation and other charges, the actual cost to CPT is much more.

If the Centre insists on the Rs 200 crore cap, then DCI, if it is really interested in the Hooghly dredging job, will be required to lower its rates. After all, the Hooghly dredging accounts for the bulk of DCI's total operations. The arrangement for rei mbursement by the Centre, in a sense, helps the DCI.

PIB is for putting cap on the dredging volume only after the completion of the proposed river regulatory scheme which comprises, among other things, capital dredging at Balari, construction of dykes and other work. Once the scheme has been implemented, t he need for maintenance dredging, it is felt, will drop substantially and 15 million cum cap will create no problem for CPT.

In case CPT is still required to undertake dredging in excess of 15 million cum, then it itself has to bear the cost.

Meanwhile, CPT sources point out that the Centre is yet to reimburse in full the maintenance dredging expenditure incurred by it in past couple of years and the total amount due will be about Rs 300 crore. ``We are still to get about Rs 148 crore from t he Government on account of dredging undertaken by the Dutch experts at Jellingham in the Hooghly'', the sources observe.