Inter-terminal Transfer Of Boxes At JNPT Boosts Rail Volumes In August

The Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, the country’s busiest container gateway, handled a record volume of rail containers in August after the port authority brokered a new deal on inter-terminal rail handling operations among all the five container terminals at the port which took effect from August 1.

- P Manoj

JNPT’s inland container depot (ICD) rail volumes hit 70,398 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in August from 68,374 TEUs in July.

From January 2019 till date, JNPT’s rail volumes have touched 514,694 TEUs.

The new deal on inter-terminal transfer of containers was signed in late July, ending a feud between Bharat Mumbai Container Terminals (BMCT) — a new facility opened by Singapore’s PSA International Pte Ltd at JNPT in February 2018 — and older facilities such as the ones run by Dubai’s DP World (Nhava Sheva International Container Terminal and Nhava Sheva (India) Gateway Terminal (NSIGT) and Denmark’s APM Terminals Management BV (Gateway Terminals India).

Unique handling system

The inter-terminal transfer of containers is a system unique to JNPT, wherein container train operators run mixed trains that carry boxes designated for more than one container terminal.