Parliamentary panel raps Shipping Ministry for slow execution of projects

NEW DELHI: A Parliamentary committee has slammed the Shipping Ministry for spending only about 13 per cent of Rs 1-lakh-crore outlay for the port sector during the 11th Plan (2007-12) and has termed the situation "alarming."

"Ministry has been able to spend only 12.88 per cent out of the total projected outlay of Rs 1,00,399 crore provided for the port sector during the entire 11th Plan ... The situation is alarming as the Ministry has miserably failed to perform both financially and physically," the panel has said in its report.

Even if the envisaged expenditure for the ongoing projects is taken into account, the percentage of utilisation of outlays comes out to be only 46.18 per cent, the Committee on Estimates, chaired by Francisco Sardinha said.

Observing that the progress made in the implementation of various projects under National Maritime Development Programme ( NMDP) is far from satisfactory, it has sought the status of incomplete projects and reasons behind delays.

"The Committee are inclined to conclude that the Ministry has neither seriously planned their projects nor monitored all the ongoing projects to ensure their timely completion.

NMDC was launched as the flagship programme in 2009 that aimed at large-scale infrastructure development in all the major ports and their capacity expansion by 2012. As much as 276 projects were planned under it but the pace of execution has been very slow.

Meanwhile, the Shipping Ministry last year unveiled a new policy for the sector that entails an investment of Rs 3 lakh crore by 2020 to take the ports capacity to 3,200 million tonnes (MT) and bring in major reforms in the space.

Unveiling the agenda, Shipping Minister G K Vasan has said that the NMDP will be replaced with the new agenda.

Of the 276 projects identified under the NMDP through public-private-partnership (PPP) mode, the government had planned to award 23 projects entailing cost of Rs 16,744 crore last year.

However, it could award only three projects worth Rs 8,000 crore out of 23 during last fiscal.

Taking note of the slow progress, the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) in April had directed fast-tracking of delayed projects.