“Corporatisation will help the ports in performing autonomously”

Rajeev Agarwal, CEO & MD, Essar Ports talks to Subhajit Roy
The Government is planning to invest Rs. 2.8 lakh crore by 2020 for port development,   how do you see the opportunities for private players?It’s a good opportunity. Basically, this is as per the plan of increasing the capacity from 1,000 million tonnes to around 3,100 million tonnes which needs about Rs. 2,80,000 crore investment and it’s a great opportunity for private sector to participate.
The Government also proposed to set up the IPL (Indian Ports Limited), is it going to create any difficulties for the private port players?   It’s good because corporatisation will help the ports to perform with more responsibility and autonomy, it will help the ports to be more transparent. It will also give them the power to take their own decisions. If we have to grow and modernise the port sector, corporatisation will really help. 
                With all these opportunities, how do you see the Essar Ports couple of years down the line?We feel that looking at the requirement of expansion in the country with increase in demand in the port sector, we will do well. We have plans to increase the capacity to 160 million tonnes by 2014 which will be very beneficial for the company because the implementation of new capacity in general is a bit slow and may take time. So, any ports capacity which gets created will definitely be of great value.    

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