The Hindu Business Line : Govt nod for Maersk-Concor bid for box terminal at JN port

THE Government has approved the highest revenue share price bid of 35.503 per cent submitted by the Maersk-Concor consortium for developing and operating a new container terminal at the Jawaharlal Nehru Port for a 30-year concession period.

Following clearance from the Union Shipping Minister, Mr T.R. Baalu, the management of Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) has issued a Letter of Intent (LI) to the Maersk-Concor team on Thursday asking it to submit an additional bid security of Rs 18 crore (over and above the Rs 4.5-crore submitted by the bidder as bid bond) within two weeks and to sign the concession and licence agreement with the port trust within eight weeks, Government sources told Business Line.

The consortium is bound by the concession agreement to make the terminal a common user facility though rival terminal operators had expressed fears that it would be converted into a captive facility by the new operator given Maersk's huge container throughput off the Western Coast and Concor's monopoly over rail haulage of containers.

Once operational, Maersk will switch its operations from the Nhava Sheva International Container Terminal (NSICT) run by P&O Ports to the new terminal. Significantly, the company which operates the world's largest container line Maersk-Sealand, contributes about 20 per cent of the total box traffic at NSICT and P&O Ports will lose this business when the new terminal comes up.