2 months ago
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GUWAHATI The Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways, Sarbananda Sonowal, connected Thursday (March 5, 2026), laid the instauration stones for the archetypal riverine lighthouses successful the country.
He initiated the enactment connected 4 specified lighthouses from Lachit Ghat successful Guwahati. These lighthouses are located strategically on the Brahmaputra River, which is National Waterway-2.
“The lighthouses astatine Pandu (western borderline of Guwahati), Silghat, Biswanath Ghat, and Bogibeel awesome a large displacement towards 24-hour navigation connected India’s inland waterways,” Mr. Sonowal said.
The project, estimated astatine astir ₹84 crore, is simply a associated task betwixt the Directorate General of Lighthouses and Lightships (DGLL) and the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI).
Three of these lighthouses volition beryllium connected the confederate slope of the Brahmaputra and 1 (Biswanath Ghat) connected the bluish bank.
According to the blueprint, each lighthouse volition beryllium 20 metres gangly and wholly solar-powered. The lighthouses person been designed with a geographical scope of 14 nautical miles and a luminous scope of 8-10 nautical miles.
Mr. Sonowal said that the lighthouse sites are being developed arsenic “tourism landmarks” featuring museums, amphitheatres, cafeterias, and landscaped nationalist spaces.
High cargo movement
IWAI officials said that the inaugural follows a 53% surge successful cargo question connected the Brahmaputra during the 2024-25 fiscal and that the stream has go a captious artery for Assam’s tea, coal, and fertiliser industries.
Mr. Sonowal said that h2o transport costs astir one-third of roadworthy transport and fractional of rail. “These lighthouses are a connection of intent: that India’s rivers are unfastened for business, circular the clock,” helium said, noting that moving freight by h2o importantly reduces c emissions and eases road congestion.
The task was formalised done an April 2025 statement betwixt the IWAI and DGLL. Each operation is scheduled for completion wrong 24 months. By enabling harmless night-time transit, the authorities aims to region the superior obstruction to continuous waterway operations.
National Waterway-2 stretches 891 km from Dhubri connected the borderline with Bangladesh to Sadiya, bordering Arunachal Pradesh, representing the longest navigable agelong successful the country.
