Sail right in: Mumbai port opens its gates to visitors

From Saturday to Friday, The Heritage Project, in collaboration with the Mumbai Port Trust, will take around 1,500 people, in batches, on a tour of the port

MUMBAI: Mumbai owes its megacity status to its port; there’s even a theory that its name draws from ‘Bom Bahia’ or ‘beautiful bay’. And yet, this hallmark in the city’s history has been out of bounds to its people. Security concerns and stringent regulations mean that all but a very few are barred. But the winds of change are blowing at last.

Sail right in: Mumbai port opens its gates to visitors

From Saturday to Friday, The Heritage Project, in collaboration with the Mumbai Port Trust (MbPT), will take around 1,500 people, in batches, on a tour of the port. Here, visitors will view the vast expanse where ships not only dock but undergo various phases of their lifecycle, getting a glimpse into an institution that has shaped the maritime and trade landscape of the city and the country, at large.

The first stop will be the dry docks. “This is where ships are built and repaired. Currently, three ships – a cruise ship and two coast guard ships are under maintenance,” said R D Tripathi, CEO of Mumbai Port Sustainability Foundation (MPSF), the sustainability arm of the MbPT. Smaller ships continue to be built at the Mumbai port, and even some ship-breaking takes place here, although the Alang ship breaking yard in Gujarat is where most ships are dismantled, Tripathi said.

Next up are the cruise landing spots, from where many a first-time visitor sets foot in Mumbai. “The terminal for international cruises is near the Green Gate. There is a newer terminal, currently under construction, which will be opened in six months. It will be able to handle 5,000 passengers per ship at a time,” said Tripathi, adding that two floors of this terminal will be open to the public during these tours.

But the Mumbai port is all about cargo. According to the MbPT website, 2,014 cargo vessels docked here during FY2023-24. This involved handling a record 67.26 million tonnes of cargo. During this time, only 118 cruise ships docked at the port, 27 of them international and 91 domestic.

Critical raw materials needed to build and run the city are offloaded at the Mumbai port. “Liquid bulk, which is petroleum, gasoline and other chemicals, arrive in tankers. They are unloaded and stored at the Jawahar Dweep Oil Terminal and Pir Pau. They are then transported through pipelines to factories and refineries in Mumbai and beyond,” he explained. “Fertilisers and cement are also received. Service offshore vessels are frequent visitors, arriving to stock up on fuel and manpower for offshore drilling vessels.”

While the port’s cargo handling is on the rise, a milestone decision was taken in the 1970s, Tripathi says, with an air of mystery. “In its current form, the port has been in development since the 1600s. It was only when the (colonial) British government realised the need for regulation and structure that they notified the MbPT in 1873,” said Tripathi, taking a dive into history. “The 1950s saw the start of containerisation – where goods were not shipped in gunny bags or individually as ‘break bulk’ but in containers. By then, Mumbai had come into its own. So, by the ’70s, the port decided to stop handling containers. It continues to handle other types of cargo.”

Tripathi said the decision was meant to prevent the city from being burdened by trucks carrying containers, which would weigh heavily on traffic and the city’s streets. Similarly, to reduce pollution, the MbPT stopped handling coal. The Nava Sheva port, now the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust in Navi Mumbai, is the landing spot for most goods. Apart from incoming cargo, Tripathi said the Mumbai port also handles cargo that is exported, in particular, cars, heavy machinery and steel.

Those who sign up for the tours will also visit other functional spaces, such as warehouses, godowns, ship berths and watch towers, alongside a war memorial, and a memorial commemorating firefighters who lost their lives in the ship 1944 explosion at the dockyard.

The tour ends with a visit to a traditional vessel from the Netherlands currently stationed here, the three-masted clipper, Stad Amsterdam.

The tour, however, is all sold out. But, as Tripathi and The Heritage Project say, this is only the first step in a phased opening of a key to Mumbai’s history. More to come!