The United Port and Dock Employees' Union, affiliated to the CITU, has condemned the handing over of the iron ore-handling complex in the Visakhapatnam port to the Essar group under a public-private partnership project and said the move will only be to the advantage of the group at the expense of the PSU port.

At a press meet here on Sunday, V.S. Padmanabha Raju, General-Secretary of the Union, and K.S Kumar, President, said the concession agreement was signed at a five-star hotel in Chennai on Friday by the port authorities in the presence of the Shipping Minister, G.K Vasan, and all norms had been violated in doing so.

They said, “In the first place, signing the pact in Chennai itself is outrageous and we went on a day's protest strike on Friday. We are planning an agitation if the Union Shipping Ministry and the port authorities do not revoke the decision.”

They said that three years ago the port had mooted the modernisation of the ore-handling complex at a cost of Rs 300 crore or so and a Japanese funding agency had come forward, but subsequently the port authorities and the Union Shipping Ministry changed the decision and decided to go for bidding to privatise the complex.

It was awarded to the Essar group for development at a cost of Rs 845 crore and the group would initially pay upfront fees of Rs 185 crore.

“The upfront fees were also reduced drastically from Rs 300 crore to Rs 185 crore to favour the group. Further, the guidelines issued by the Union Government itself on PPP projects were violated. One of the guidelines clearly states that no one private group or company should be allowed to monopolise the PPP projects in a PSU organisation. Already, the Essar group has been awarded berths in the outer harbour as well as the inner harbour. Now the ore handling complex has gone to the group as well,” they said.

The two union leaders alleged that there were several other violations and a case was pending in the AP High Court against the move of the authorities.

“We demand that the contract be revoked and the port take up the modernisation work on its own. It has reserves of Rs 2,000 crore and it can easily borrow from the market, if need be. In fact, when there were no takers for WQ-7 and WQ-8 berths in the port, the authorities have gone ahead and taken up the projects on their own at a cost of Rs 394 crore. The same can be done for the ore handling complex,” they added.

They also questioned the claims of the authorities that the capacity of the complex would be doubled after the completion of the project to 24 million tonnes or so. “In fact, the OHC is currently handling 16-18 million tonnes of iron ore per annum and it is the highest revenue earner for the Vizag port, mainly dependent on bulk cargoes. The OHC, built in 1965, is indeed like the heart of Visakhapatnam. They have sold it with impunity,” the union leaders alleged.

>sarma.rs@thehindu.co.in

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