Waterways

• Since time immemorial, India was one of the seafaring countries.
• Its waterways are the cheapest means of transport.
• They are most suitable for carrying heavy and bulky goods.

• It is a fuel-efficient and environment friendly mode of transport.
• India has inland navigation waterways of 14,500 km in length.
• Out of these only 3,700 km are navigable by mechanized boats.

NATIONAL WATER WAYS:

• The Ganga river between Allahabad and Haldia (1620 km)-N.W. No. 1.
• The West-Coast Canal in Kerala (Kottapurma-Komman, Udyogamandal and Champakkara canals-205 km) – N.W. No. 3 The other viable inland waterways include the Godavari, Krishna, Barak, Sunderbans, Buckingham Canal, Brahmani, East-west Canal and Damodar Valley Corporation Canal.

Water ways in Kerala

• Apart from these, India’s trade with foreign countries is carried from the ports located along the coast.
• 95 per cent of the country’s trade volume (68 per cent in terms of value) is moved by Sea.

The Waterways In Kerala

• India is dotted with 12 major and 0pt1 medium and minor ports. These major ports handle 95 per cent of India’s foreign trade.
• Kandla in Kuchcha was the first port developed soon after Independence to ease the volume of trade on the Mumbai port, in the wake of loss of Karachi port to Pakishtan after the Partition.
• Kandla is a tidal port. It catlers to the convenient handling of exports and imports of highly productive granary and industrial belt stretching across the states of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Gujarat.
• Mumbai is the biggest port with a spacious natural and well-sheltered harbour.
• The Jawaharla Nehru port was planned with a view to decongest the Mumbai port and serve as a hub port for this region.
• Marmagao port (Goa) is the premier iron ore exporting port of the country.
• This port accounts for about fifty per cent of India’s iron ore export.
• New Mangalore port, located in Karnataka caters to the export of iron ore concentrates from Kudremukh port, located at the entrance of a lagoon with a natural harboour.
• Tuticorine port on the east coast in you port of this port has a natural harbour and rich hinterland.
• Thus, it has a flourishing trade handling of a large variety of cargoes to even our neighbouring countries like Sri Lanka, Maldives, etc. and the coastal regions of India.
• Chennai is one of the oldest artificial ports of the country. It is ranked next to Mumbai in terms of the volume of trade and cargo.
• Vishakhapatnam is the deepest landlocked and well-protected port.
• This port was, originally, conceived as an outlet for iron ore exports.
• Paradip port located in Orissa, specializes in the export of iron ore.
• Kolkata is an inland riverine export. This port serves a very large and rich hinterland of Ganga-Brahmaputra basin. Being a tidal port, it requires constant dredging of Hoogley.
• Haldia port was developed as a subsidiary port, in order to relieve growing pressure on the Kolkata port.

Related Topics

• Roadways
• Railways
• Airways