Multimodal Transportation: Vision Of Niti Aayog

Appropriate policy framework and favourable regulations form the corner stone for the growth of any sector and logistics is no different. At the CEO Conclave, Ravinder Goyal, IRTS, Adviser (Infrastructure Connectivity), NITI Aayog, in conversation with Anil Devli, CEO, INSA, deciphers the role of Niti Aayog - a think tank driving policy formulation in India, in promoting multimodal logistics.

Anil Devli: What is your role as Advisor, Infrastructure Connectivity at NITI Aayog and what is the vision of Niti Aayog as far as maritime sector is concerned?

Ravinder Goyal: There are a lot of misconceptions about the role of Niti Aayog in the transport sector. Niti Aayog has evolved from the earlier role of planning commission which was basically appraising the state’s plans and the ministries plans and regulating the funding also. Subsequently when Niti Aayog was transformed into an organisation, the role given to Niti Aayog is that of a think tank and an action tank. The whole idea is that it should be able to drive the policy of India. To this end Niti Aayog for the past three years organises workshops,writes policy papers, consults various stakeholders across industries.

Focusing particularly on multimodal transport, the mandate for Niti Aayog is:

1. As there are sectorial imbalances and modal imbalances in the transport sector, the freight has shifted from rail to road. Earlier the road share used to be much less than 14-15 per cent at the time of independence, now the road’s share is almost 67-68 per cent. this has its own drawbacks in the sense railways despite being the economical mode of transport is carrying much less freight than what it should be carrying. The result is congestion on roads, average speed has decreased and cost of logistics has gone up. One mandate for Niti Aayog is to correct the imbalances in the modal mix. For instance, coastal shipping is currently playing a very minor role in logistics. The capacity at the ports is growing at the rate of 16 per cent annually, whereas the cargo is only growing at 5 per cent. The port capacity is still underutilised, so there is lot of scope for coastal shipping which can correct these modal imbalances and ultimately cut down the logistics cost.