Mumbai, Oct 13 (IANS) The 21st Maritime State Development Council (MSDC) on Tuesday decided that all major and non-major ports in India must adopt uniform digital procedures, integrate with the Maritime Single Window platform, and publish tariffs electronically by March 2027 as part of the One Nation One Port Process (ONOP) reforms for the ease of doing business.
The MSDC meeting chaired by Union Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways Sarbananda Sonowal has also made transparency of port tariffs through electronic publication mandatory.
The ONOP reforms include One Nation One Documentation, Port Process Re-engineering and Inter-ministerial Process Reforms, to be implemented across all ports, according to an official statement. .
To support uniform implementation, Minister Sonowal launched the Ready Reckoner for Implementing ONOP, a comprehensive guide for major and other than major ports.
The document includes references to central circulars issued by Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, Ministry of Home Affairs, and Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for implementing inter-ministerial process reforms, and sets out clear expectations from state and Union Territory governments to expedite ONOP implementation.
MSDC also adopted the Maritime India Vision 2030 and Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047 targets, which together identify more than 500 initiatives across ports, shipping, inland waterways, shipbuilding, green shipping and global collaboration.
States and State Maritime Boards were urged to prepare port master plans for other than major ports aligned with these national targets, with Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways sharing the standardised template used by major ports.
The Council endorsed the priorities of the National Perspective Plan and urged states to fast-track multimodal connectivity projects through road, rail, inland waterways, pipelines and conveyors.
It resolved that states, in coordination with Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, to develop port-linked industrial clusters with land availability, plug-and-play infrastructure and fast-tracked approvals, integrated with port capacity expansion and connectivity projects.
On statutory compliance, the Council approved draft MSDC regulations and guidelines on port data and tariff transparency, and instructed all states and Union Territories to notify subordinate rules under Section 77 of the Act within three months.
Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said, “The Indian Ports Act gave the MSD council its legal foundation. Today the Centre and the coastal states turned that foundation into a shared work plan, with deadlines every one of us has agreed to meet.”
“This is cooperative federalism in maritime governance, delivering for our ports and for port-led industrialisation.”
The Council gave particular emphasis to port connectivity, shipbuilding and cruise shipping. It resolved to prioritise connectivity projects under Sagarmala, implement the National Coastal and Inland Shipping Strategic Plan, promote modal shift of cargo to coastal shipping, facilitate development of shipbuilding, ship-repair and recycling clusters, and leverage the Maritime Development Fund, Shipbuilding Development Scheme and Shipbuilding Financial Assistance Programme for financing. Cruise shipping infrastructure development at major and non-major ports was also endorsed.
A significant announcement was made by Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, introducing two specialised credit risk insurance products to support India’s shipbuilding industry under the National Shipbuilding Mission.
Developed under the Shipbuilding Development Scheme (SbDS), these first-of-their-kind insurance policies aim to reduce financial stress in large-scale ship manufacturing.
Union Minister Sonowal said, “Building a ship is a massive, multi-year journey, a single missed milestone payment could stall an entire shipyard’s operations. With these new insurance policies, we are stepping in to give them a real safety net.”
He emphasised the significance of the meeting, saying, “The MSDC has now entered a new statutory phase, strengthening cooperative federalism in maritime governance.”
–IANS
sps/khz
