The government has come up with an answer to the delay in projects under the National Maritime Development Programme (NMDP). A brand new programme – Perspective 2020 – will replace the existing plan.
The shipping ministry will carry forward the pending work under NMDP in its new decade-long project. Major ports have been able to complete only one-fifth of the 276 projects that were to be completed by 2012. “The projects which are yet to be completed under NMDP will be included in the Perspective 2020,” a senior official said.
Analysts believe the launch of the programme is more a political announcement, since NMDP was the brainchild of the previous shipping minister, T R Baalu. The new programme being formulated under the aegis of the current minister G K Vasan, would carry his tag.
Vasan will be following a precedent set by DMK’s Baalu, who in the first UPA tenure, had replaced the “Sagar Mala” programme of the previous NDA government. Former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had announced the programme in his independence day speech on August 15, 2003.
NMDP was formulated for the period 2005-12. Total investment involved under the programme was Rs1,00,339 crore.
Under the programme, 276 projects were to be taken up for ‘implementation’ but only 56 projects have been implemented so far, of which eight projects have been completed in the current financial year. “The 2012 deadline for NMDP was only for award of contracts and not completion,” the official added.
The new plan would cover not just major ports but also state controlled non-major ports. Besides, the perspective 2020 would list target for the shipping sector. The Maritime Policy will also be part of the new plan. “It is natural to extend the period of a plan when it is about to end or come up with a new plan. But this alone will not help. One needs to honestly look back and accept the failure so things can be rectified in the new plan,” said Vishwas Udgirkar, senior director, Deloitte.
