Acute congestion at the Kolkata dock has hit Container Corporation of India (Concor), which operates a terminal at the dock and runs regular services to Birganj, Nepal and Amingaon, Assam for handling international traffic and to various other inland destinations for domestic traffic.
On an average about 3,000 TEUs containing Nepal-bound imports arrive at the dock every month and nearly 2,000 TEUs of them are Birganj-bound, the balance being for other Nepalese destinations.
Concor accounts for an estimated of 80 percent of the Birganj-bound boxes while the balance 20 percent is transported by road. Ideally, it should handle 1,600 TEUs per month. For the past couple of months, it has been handling much less than that, thanks to the congestion at Kolkata.
An estimated 8,000 containers are clogging the parking lots of the container berths at Kolkata as space is available to store only half of them. The first-in-first-out principle is not being followed in matter of evacuation of the boxes with the result old boxes often get buried under the new arrivals. The problem has also been compounded by the shortage of handling equipment.
In view of the congestion at Netaji Subhas Dock (NSD) under KDS, the container ships are being berthed at Kidderpore dock, also under Kolkata Dock. Thee dock has no rail connection and as a result, the import boxes unloaded from the ships at Kidderpore dock's berths are being transported by road to Concor's terminal located at the NSD. For the loading of export boxes, the same ship has to come to NSD berths again. Also, special arrangements are being made for the Customs clearance. All these entail delay and extra cost.
Meanwhile, Concor has started handling domestic tea traffic on the Amingaon-Kolkata Dock section, the customers being companies such as McLeod Russel, Assam Company and Hindustan Unilever. Earlier, it used to be only tea for exports. The company has deployed four rakes on the circuit and the domestic tea traffic accounts for an estimated 25 percent of the throughput on the route.
In October, Concor operated as many as 12 services on the Kolkata Dock-Amingaon-Kolkata Dock circuit, the highest so far in a single month. At this rate, the throughput of tea exports on the route, it is felt, might be the same as the last year's 2,600 TEUs.
Earlier, the apprehension was that the throughput this year might be less than that in the last year in view of not-so-bright prospects for tea exports.
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