Rajya Sabha MP Rwngwra Narzary puts up questions on river cruise tourism project

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOKRAJHAR: Rajya Sabha MP Rwngwra Narzary raised questions on the transformative initiative of the Government of India to develop the river cruise tourism project in Assam, in the ongoing Parliament session. 

In his reply, the Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways Sarbananda Sonowal said that the transformative initiatives to modernize inland water transport facilities was taken up in the North-Eastern states for development of river cruise tourism. He said that the comprehensive development of National Waterway (NW)-2 (Brahmaputra River) had been undertaken at the cost of Rs 498 crore during 2020-21 to 2024-25 which included important projects like construction of Bogibeel and Jogighopa terminals, tourist jetties at Bogibeel and Pandu, regular fairway development works, and navigational aids for smooth shipping and navigation. He further said that the construction of a ship repair facility at Pandu and elevated road connecting National Highway-27 with Pandu port and ship repair facility had also been taken up at a cost of Rs 419 crore.

He also said that as part of comprehensive development of NW-16 (Barak River), projects had been undertaken at a cost of Rs 134.72 crore from 2020-21 that include upgradation of terminals at Badarpur and Karimganj, fairway development, maintenance of navigational aids, procurement of amphibian dredgers, etc. while the NW-57 (Kopili River) was operationalized with the movement of 300 metric tonnes of cement from Chandrapur (Kamrup) to Hatsingimari (South Salmara-Mankachar).

Sonowal said that under the Central Sector Schemes (CSS) for development of IWT in NER states, projects had been sanctioned for terminal and fairway development and procurement of small passenger vessels. He added that the Inland Waterways Authority of India (WAI), an autonomous organization under MoPSW, was developing dedicated cruise terminals on NW-2. The location earmarked for development of cruise terminals are Guwahati, Neamati, Biswanath Ghat, Silghat, and Guizan, he said, adding that a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) comprising Sagarmala Finance Corporation Limited, IWAl, and Inland Water Transport and Tourism Department of Assam Government had taken up the work of development of religious tourism circuit connecting seven temples, namely Lachit Ghat, Aswanta Temple Ghat, Doul Govinda Mandir Ghat, Hanuman Mandir Ghat (Uzan Bazar), Umananda Ghat, Pandunath Ghat, and Kamakhya Temple, using suitable vessels on a hop-on hop-off model.

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