Krishnapatnam port to begin operations tomorrow

Hyderabad: Ms Sonia Gandhi, Chairperson of United Progressive Alliance’s National Advisory Council, will dedicate to the nation the Rs 10,000-crore Krishnapatnam Port.

She would flag off the commercial operations of the first phase of the project, which would have four berths two for coal and one each for iron and general cargo.

The 5,000-acre port would begin with a capacity of 20 million tonnes of cargo and would go up to 90 mt four years later.

The port company, promoted by the CVR group (backed by the Hyderabad-based Navayuga Engineering Company), has been given the mandate for modernising the existing port into a deepwater port on BOST (build-operate-share-transfer) basis for a period of 50 years.

The port is expected to handle 2 lakh containers in the first year and 4.5 lakh containers in the following year. Claimed to be the biggest container terminal in the country, the port would have 41 berths when all the three phases are completed.