BHUBANESWAR: With Paradip emerging as a major port based industrial hub in Eastern India, Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan on Tuesday urged Union Civil Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhu for setting up an airport in the port town.
The grand vision for development of Paradip would remain incomplete without an airport, as the nearest airport at Bhubaneswar is 135 km away and takes more than 3 hours by road, Pradhan said in a letter to Prabhu. The Paradip Port Trust is learnt to have requested the Airport Authority of India to set up an airport in Paradip, he added.
Pradhan said Paradip port, which handled a total cargo of over 100 million tonnes last year, is being further expanded and modernised. It is expected that the port would be able to handle 332 million tonnes of cargo per annum by 2020 thereby making it the largest port in India. He said the Centre has declared Paradip Port as a Smart Port Industrial City.
Besides having the port, Paradip already has an oil refinery of 15 million tonnes per annum (MMTPA) capacity, a 12 MMTPA pellet plant, two fertiliser plants with combined capacity of 4 MMTPA and one edible oil processing plant, said Pradhan.
In addition, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas is implementing several big ticket industrial projects, including expansion of refinery to 21 MMTPA from 15 MMTPA, a 700 TMT poly propylene plant by 2018 and a 355 TMT mono ethyl glycol (MEG) unit by 2023-24 which will feed various downstream industries including plastics, paints, rubber and synthetic yarn industries. “These industries will spur economic growth and feed the upcoming plastics park,” the letter said.
Pradhan also informed that a gas pipe-line under Pradhan Mantri Urja Ganga project is being laid up to Paradip to meet the energy demand. Further, a multi-modal logistics park offering 10 lakh sq ft space for warehousing is being implemented in Paradip under Bharatmala to meet the demands on logistics and warehousing.
Since these initiatives require seamless connectivity, massive expansion of road and rail network such as 8-laning of Chandikhole-Paradip National Highway, construction of Digha-Gopalpur Coastal Highway via Paradip and Haridaspur-Paradip railway line is underway. Further, development of National Inland Waterway-5 is being implemented with an investment of Rs 4,190 crore which is expected to be completed by 2023, he observed. Pradhan requested the Union Aviation minister to direct the AAI to conduct a feasibility study for the airport at Paradip at the earliest possible.