At a public gathering on Thursday (25 August), Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy announced Machilipatnam port construction had received approval from the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

Machilipatnam Port, located 65 kilometres from the trading hub of Vijayawada in the Krishna District, will have a draft of 14.5 metres and can handle 26 million tonnes of cargo annually.

AP Maritime Board planned to build the Port in two phases.

During the first phase, this deep-water, all-weather multi-purpose Port will have four cargo berths serving the primary hinterland of Andhra Pradesh's Krishna, West Godavari, East Godavari, and Guntur districts.

The Port will receive 65,000 DWT vessels during the 1st phase, and approximately 3,000 acres of land will be allocated for port-based development.

The first phase will cover 1,926.39 acres, and the second phase will cover 1,910 acres, reports Telangana Today.

While 1,727 acres of government land are available to finish the first phase of port works, another 183 acres of private land must be acquired to build a road and railway network link to the port.

The Current Stage Of The Project

• In Phase I, an investment of approximately Rs.1860 Crores is expected to develop the Port with three berths, breakwaters, navigational channels, floating crafts, mechanical equipment, and so on.

• Work on land acquisition is currently underway.

• It is proposed to build two general cargo berths and one OSV berth.

• Channel proposed depth: 12.80 Mt.

• In Phase I, the proposed ship handled capacity is 65000 DWT.

• The expected handling capacity is 17 million tonnes.

A full-scale operation of the Port is expected to create 20,000 direct and indirect jobs.

In January 2022, the Andhra Pradesh Maritime Board (APMB) received in-principle approval from a consortium of banks led by the State Bank of India (SBI) to raise funds worth Rs 15 billion by securitizing port revenue for the development of three port projects, including the current project.