The Union Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways has taken an initiative to connect Tripura’s Gomati river with Bangladesh’s Meghna river.
The central government has already sanctioned Rs 24.52 crore for the construction of internal waterways communication project in the state.
Under this project, the Gomati river will be excavated from Sonamura to Udaipur (40 km), 9 floating jetties will be set up and the river bank will be protected from erosion.
Transport Minister Sushant Chowdhury mentioned in a written reply to a question from MLA Nirmal Biswas in the Tripura Assembly on Thursday.
On last day of Winter session today, the transport minister said that the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) constructed a temporary floating jetty at Srimantapur in Sonamura and handed it over to the Land Ports Authority of India on July 7, 2020. He said that the work of river bank protection and excavation is currently being carried out by the state’s Water Resources Department.
In addition, the Sonamura-Daudkandi river route was declared as an international water transportation protocol route on May 5, 2020 to implement this plan. This protocol route will be linked to National Waterway-1 (Ganges River), National Waterway-2 (Brahmaputra River), National Waterway-16 (Barak River) and Kaladan River of Myanmar. As a result, Tripura will be connected with other states of India’s mainland and neighboring states of Southeast Asia by water route.
The transport minister said that the proposal to extend the Sonamura-Daudkandi protocol route to Udaipur (40 km) is under consideration by the Inland Waterways Transport Department. In the future, this waterway will connect the Sonamura port of India to the Chittagong port of Bangladesh via Kolkata’s Haldia port.
The transport minister further said that the state’s transport department has already provided Rs 2.90 crore to the Public Works Department (Public Works Department) for excavation, increased navigability and river bank protection of the Gomati river.
In a written reply to another question from opposition leader Anirban Debbarma, transport minister Sushant Choudhury said that surveys have been conducted in Muhuri, Khowai and Manu rivers for the construction of floating jetties and establishment of internal water transportation system under the Sagarmala Project.
The transport minister said that recently, the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways of the central government has included the purchase of small-sized ships under the guidelines on inland public transportation. The maximum cost limit for this material has been fixed at Rs 5 crore. In addition, a proposal of Rs 49.04 crore for 8 pleasure boats in the Dorkhur reservoir has been sent to the ministry by the state government’s tourism department.