River route adds wind to
hydel project sails
OUR CORRESPONDENT TELEGRAPH INDIA
Karimganj
Nov. 13: A landmark navigation facility is set to
be inaugurated soon in the Barak waterways between
Bhanga village in Karimganj district on the
Indo-Bangladesh border and Tipaimukh, the site of a Rs
6,000-crore mega hydel power complex in southwest
Manipur.
The primary aim is to ease transportation of materials
for the proposed plant in
Manipur.
Official sources here aver that the introduction of
river cargo services on the 210-km river stretch will
give a much-needed shot in the arm to this meandering
river that has been declared by the Centre as National
Waterway 6.
At the branch office of the Central Inland Water
Transport Corporation (CIWTC) in Karimganj, senior
officials of the corporation yesterday said that cargo
ships would initially ply between Silchar, the second
largest town in
Assam, and the project site at Tipaimukh, a
hilltop village atthe confluence of the Barak and the
Tuivai rivers.
This will help the North Eastern Electric Power
Corporation (Neepco), a public-sector undertaking that
has been selected by the Union power ministry to set up
the 1500-MW project at the tribal village, meet its
transportation needs.
The CIWTC, in collaboration with the Inland Water
Transport (IWT) department of the state government, is
now preparing a blueprint for a busy river traffic on
the Barak by its busy cargo ships to augment easy
tranship-ment of materials between Barak districts and
southwest Manipur — both equally backward and difficult
regions in terms of accessibility.
The chairman-cum-managing director of the
Calcutta-headquartered CIWTC, Prafulla Tayel, recently
held talks with senior central and the state government
officials in Silchar to remove last-minute hitches and
pave way for transportation of goods between Cachar in
Assam and Churachandpur district of Manipur using
river traffic.
He was accompanied by a cluster of senior officials on
board MV Prafulla, a cargo ship. The team
assessed the need of using dredgers to flush out silt
that has accumulated over the years in the Barak
affecting steamer traffic, particularly in winter.
“There is an urgent need to set up a few terminal points
on the
Barak river between Silchar town and Tipaimukh
for ferrying of goods between Assam and Manipur,” Tayel
said.
Sources in the CIWTC said the corporation was
considering installing such facilities at Silchar,
located on the Barak riverfront, and its nearby trade
points — Shibpurikhal, Chhoto Bekera, Boro Bekera and
Jiribam.
The terminal at Silchar will come up at Itkhola ghat
on the northern flank of the town where there was a
shipyard and a godown for helping streamer traffic
between
Calcutta and Cachar district before Independence
Steamers continued to ply for some more years after
1947.
Traffic between Karimganj and
Calcutta along a 1,100-km-long river stretch
passing through
Bangladesh was terminated after the 1965
Indo-Pakistan war. Attempts are now being made to
restore regular river traffic on either side.
At present cargo ships sail up to Karimganj and Badarpur
in Karimganj district via
Bangladesh to ferry goods like cement and
rice from West Bengal only during the monsoon months. On
their return journey, the ships carry consignments of
tea, paper and raw agriculture products from the Barak
Valley.
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