India's National Waterways Move Record 145.5 Million Tonnes Cargo In FY25, Marking Eight-Fold Growth Over A Decade

Cargo traffic on India’s national waterways touched an all-time high of 145.5 million tonnes in the financial year 2024-25 (FY25), according to the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways.

This marks a nearly eight-fold jump from FY14, when the volume was 18.10 MMT, reflecting a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 20.86 per cent over the last decade.

The year-on-year growth stood at 9.34 per cent over FY24, with five commodities—coal, iron ore, iron ore fines, sand, and fly ash—contributing more than 68 per cent of the total cargo volume moved.

The number of operational national waterways also increased from 24 to 29 during FY25.

Key Drivers Behind The Surge

The ministry credited policy reforms, improved infrastructure, and targeted schemes for the upsurge:

• Jalvahak Scheme: Launched in December 2024, the scheme incentivises cargo owners and operators by covering 35 per cent of actual waterway operating expenses.

  To give further push to the scheme, scheduled cargo services were operationalised on NW-1 (Ganga), NW-2 (Brahmaputra), and NW-16 (Barak River) via the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol.

  The initiative is expected to shift 800 million tonne-kilometers of cargo to inland waterways—accounting for nearly 17 per cent of the current 4,700 million tonne-kilometers of cargo on National Waterways.

• Digital Ease of Doing Business: The ministry, through the IWAI, has introduced a digital portal to simplify No Objection Certificate (NOC) approvals for allowing development of terminals and jetties on national waterways.

  Further, other digital solutions has been implemented for ease of business like CAR-D portal and PANI portal, Central database for registration of vessel and crew (Jalyaan and Navic) to promote digitisation, Naudarshika (National River Traffic and Navigational System) for safety and smooth operations of inland vessels.

• Infrastructure Upgrades: End-to-end fairway dredging contracts were implemented, along with deployment of Ro-Ro and Ro-Pax ferry services.

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