Mumbai: The Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority (JNPA), in partnership with the Maharashtra Maritime Board, is advancing plans for the upcoming Vadhavan Port in Palghar district by seeking 100 hectares of forest land to establish a stone quarry. The quarry will serve as a key source of construction material for the port’s ambitious infrastructure, JNPA chairperson Unmesh Wagh confirmed.
Wagh explained that the stones would be used to build the offshore breakwater, port facilities and other supporting structures. “We have been allowed to conduct necessary tests to check the quality of stones,” he said, as quoted by the Hindustan Times.
Geo-technical Survey To Be Done
On Wednesday, the state forest department issued a government resolution (GR) permitting JNPA to conduct a geo-technical survey across 295.23 hectares of dense forest land in Khanivade and Gargaon villages. The GR allows drilling of 20 boreholes for testing.
Officials clarified that the legal status of the land would remain unchanged during the testing phase and that no tree felling would be permitted. Based on the survey results, JNPA will select 100 hectares for quarrying. However, environmentalists have raised strong concerns over the move alleging that the planned quarry would damage the local ecology.
Details Of Mega Project
The proposed Vadhavan Port is one of India’s largest greenfield maritime projects, requiring reclamation of nearly 1,448 hectares of land from the sea. The plan includes a 10.14-km offshore breakwater and extensive cargo and container storage facilities. Once completed, the port is projected to handle around 23.2 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalents) annually, placing it among the top global ports.
The first phase of the project is expected to be ready by 2029. The port will feature nine container terminals, each 1,000 metres long, four multipurpose berths including a coastal berth, four liquid cargo berths, a roll-on/roll-off berth and a Coast Guard berth.
To support logistics, the port will be connected via a 32-km road to the Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway and a 22-km road to the Mumbai-Vadodara highway. A 12-km rail line will link it to the Delhi-Mumbai dedicated freight corridor, further boosting its role as a strategic maritime hub.
