Also present at the meeting were Prasun Mukherjee, a representative of Salim group which had originally been assigned the task of building the port and M L Meena, environmental secretary.

The Haldia Port, meanwhile, is in focus for its depth-related issues. Senior officials have said that extensive dredging in the area has led to a slight improvement in the depth in Aukland and Jellingham.

“The depth has certainly gone up in both the places and now stands at 3.8 meters at Aukland and four meters at Jellingham. At present, there are six dredgers at work and we hope to get dredger 17 soon to speed up things,” said A Majumdar, acting chairman of Kolkata Port Trust (KoPT).

Calcutta Port officials added that the rise in depth is still not satisfactory.

“During the flood season, a lot of silt flows down the river and gets accumulated but in the non-rainy season it is not a problem. With the work at Eden channel too becoming slow, the siltation will only add to the port’s problems,” said a port official.