By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, September 22, 2015 : Cargo operation at Paradip Port will resume on Wednesday after a week-long logjam over cargo handling in the wake of a meeting between the district administration and representatives of the key stakeholders on Tuesday afternoon.

The contending parties has arrived at an amicable settlement. “We have come to an agreement according to which normal loading and uploading operations would resume from 6 am tomorrow,” said Capt Naik, vice president of Seaways Shipping and Logistics after the meeting.

Stevedoring operations at the second best port was badly hit for close to a week because of a strike by Paradip Port Stevedores’ Association (PPSA) and nine other organisations backing it.
An agreement had also been reached at the meeting not to go ahead with the cancellation of licence of the striking stevedoring operators, he said.

The president of Paradip Port Stevedores’ Association Mahimananda Mishra and representatives of other organisations backing the strike were present at the meeting convened by Jagatsinghpur collector Bijaya Ketan Upadhaya in an effort to break the deadlock.

Earlier in the day, office bearers of the Federation of Associations of Stevedores (FAS) and Paradip Port Stevedores Association (PPSA) went into a huddle to end the impasse at the major port over cargo handling.
Federation’s president K V Krishna Kumar, Secretary Jogesh Mehta and member Asish Mochoda, who arrived at Paradip yesterday evening met the PPSA office bearers to find out the reasons leading to the dispute analysed the rules and regulations of PPSA and the stand of the port management.

Federation office bearers had a meeting with Paradip Port Trust (PPT) deputy chairman M Bhayapuri in the absence of chairman-n-charge M T Krishna Babu.

The PPT management had toughened its stand on the striking stevedores on Monday with PPT chairman M T Krishna Babu warning that strong action will be taken against those violating port rules. Babu had said if the situation so demands, the port management may float open tender for stevedoring.

The dispute arose at the port over handing over of stevedoring job to Seaways Shipping & Logistics Pvt Ltd (SSLPL), an Andhra Pradesh based stevedoring firm which is not a member of PPSA.