Inland waterways

Topic: Transport and Communication in India · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 7 "Transport and Communication"; Class 12, Ch 7 "Transport and Communication"

Meaning

Inland waterways are water routes inside a country, away from the open sea, where boats can move. They include rivers, canals, backwaters and creeks. India has about 14,500 km of navigable waterways. They are the cheapest and cleanest way to move heavy, bulky cargo, but today they carry only a small share of India's traffic. The government is now trying to bring them back into wide use.

Explanation

Parts and types

• Four kinds of water body are used:
• Rivers, e.g. the Ganga and the Brahmaputra.
• Canals: channels dug by people.
• Backwaters (kayals): long, quiet lagoons and channels that run beside the sea. The best examples are in Kerala.

• Creeks: narrow arms of the sea that reach into the coast, often at a river mouth. Examples are on the Maharashtra and Gujarat coasts.

• When a waterway counts as "navigable" (open to boats): vessels of at least 50 tonnes must be able to use it in normal conditions. Its length is measured along the middle of the channel [2].

• Three types of inland waterway [2]:

Type	What it is	Indian example
Open river waterway	A natural river that flows freely. Only small works keep it deep enough.	Brahmaputra (NW-2)
Canalised waterway	A river split into calmer sections by locks (gated chambers that lift or lower boats) and dams	Ganga at the Farakka lock (NW-1)
Canal	A channel dug by people for boats	West Coast Canal (NW-3), Buckingham Canal (NW-4)

What a waterway needs to work

• Three basic things [2]:
• a fairway: a channel that is wide and deep enough for boats
• terminals: places where boats load and unload, linked to road and rail

• navigational aids: buoys, lights and markers that guide boats

• Dredging (digging sand and silt out of the riverbed) keeps the fairway deep [2].

• A National Waterway is called "operational" only when it has all three: a deep enough fairway, working terminals and navigational aids [2].

Why waterways are useful

• Cheapest mode of transport. It saves fuel and harms the environment less.
• Water transport uses about 3–6 times less energy than road and up to 2 times less than rail. It also makes less noise and pollution (ILO, cited by PIB, 2026) [2].

• One inland vessel of about 2,000 tonnes can replace nearly 125 trucks of 16 tonnes each [2].

• Best for heavy, bulky, low-value goods such as coal, ores, cement and food grains.

• Coal, iron ore, iron ore fines, sand and fly ash made up over 68% of cargo on National Waterways in 2024-25 [3].

• Uses very little land. It takes load off crowded roads and railways. It also supports Ro-Ro ferries (roll-on/roll-off: vehicles drive straight onto the boat) and tourism [2].

Rise, decline and revival

• Before 1853 (when the first railway opened), rivers were the chief mode of transport. The Ganga and the Brahmaputra carried most trade between the inland plains and the ports.
• Why they declined:
• Railways and roads were stronger competitors. They were faster, ran all year and reached places far from rivers.
• River water was taken for irrigation. Canals and barrages drew water out of the rivers, so less water flowed downstream. Long stretches became too shallow for boats (non-navigable).

• Siltation and seasonal flow. Rivers are low in the dry season and hard to use during floods.

• Result: NCERT puts the share of India's traffic carried on waterways at about 1%. The current official figure for their share of freight is about 2%, and the target is 5% [2].

• Revival:
• Cargo on National Waterways grew from 18.10 MMT (FY 2013-14) to about 145.5 MMT (FY 2024-25). That is a CAGR of 20.86% (CAGR means the average growth each year) [3].
• A later official figure for 2024-25 is 145.84 MMT [2].
• In FY 2025-26 the figure was 198 MMT up to February 2026 [2].
• Passengers on National Waterways rose from 1.61 crore (2023-24) to 7.6 crore (2024-25) [2].

Where it occurs

• Who runs it:
• The Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) builds and manages the National Waterways.
• It was created under the IWAI Act, 1985 and set up on 27 October 1986 [2].
• It works under the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, with its headquarters in Noida (UP).

• It is also the competent authority under the Inland Vessels Act, 2021, which sets one common set of rules for inland vessels across India [2].

• National Waterways Act, 2016 (enacted on 25 March 2016) [2]:

• It declared 111 National Waterways (NWs): 5 old + 106 new.
• They cover 20,187 km in 23 states and 4 UTs.
• 32 NWs (5,155 km) were operational as of March 2026 [2].

• Parliament declares a National Waterway, and the Centre develops it. All other waterways are left to the states.

• The five original National Waterways:

NW	Route	Length	States
NW-1	Ganga–Bhagirathi–Hooghly, Prayagraj–Haldia	1,620 km	UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal
NW-2	Brahmaputra, Sadiya–Dhubri	891 km	Assam
NW-3	West Coast Canal, Kottapuram–Kollam + Champakara (14 km) + Udyogmandal (23 km) canals	205 km	Kerala
NW-4	Godavari and Krishna stretches + Kakinada–Puducherry canals (incl. Buckingham Canal)	1,078 km	Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry
NW-5	Brahmani, Matai, Mahanadi–Brahmani delta channels, East Coast Canal	588 km	Odisha, West Bengal

• NW-1: mechanised boats go up to Patna, and ordinary boats up to Haridwar. The river gets shallower upstream. Large cruise vessels usually stop at Patna because of low depth and pontoon bridges (floating bridges laid across the river) [2].
• NW-2: steamers go up to Dibrugarh (1,384 km). New terminals have been built at Bogibeel and Jogighopa, along with a ship repair facility at Pandu (Guwahati) [2].
• NW-5: under Budget 2026-27 it will link the Talcher–Angul mineral belt to Kalinganagar (a steel hub) and the ports of Paradip and Dhamra [2].
• Other waterways:
• Goa: Mandovi (NW-68), Zuari (NW-111) and Cumberjua (NW-27) carry iron ore barges to Mormugao port [2].
• Sundarbans (West Bengal) is NW-97, and the Barak (Assam) is NW-16, with terminals at Badarpur and Karimganj [2].
• Kerala backwaters: NW-3, NW-8 (Alappuzha–Changanassery) and NW-9 (Alappuzha–Kottayam–Athirampuzha) [2]. The Nehru Trophy boat race is held on Punnamada Lake, Alappuzha.

• Kochi Water Metro (since 2023) is India's first urban mass transit system built on water. It is planned as 15 routes, about 78 km, linking 10 islands [2].

• Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route (1972): runs Kolkata–Haldia → Sundarbans → Bangladesh rivers (Padma/Jamuna/Meghna) → NW-2 and NW-16 in Assam. It gives the landlocked North-East an outlet to the sea without using the Siliguri Corridor.

• Jal Marg Vikas Project (JMVP): a World Bank-aided project on NW-1 (Varanasi–Haldia, 1,390 km) [2].
• It keeps a depth of 2.2–3.0 m for at least 330 days a year, so vessels of 1,500–2,000 DWT can use the river. DWT (deadweight tonnage) is the weight a ship can carry [2].
• Multi-Modal Terminals are at Varanasi, Sahibganj and Haldia. There is also a new navigation lock at Farakka [2].
• Cargo on NW-1 rose from 5.05 MMT (2014-15) to 16.38 MMT (2024-25) [2][3].

Don't confuse with

• Coastal shipping: ships move along the sea coast between ports. Inland waterways run inside the land, on rivers, canals, backwaters and creeks. (Budget 2026-27 targets their combined share rising from 6% to 12% by 2047 [2].)
• Navigable waterways (~14,500 km) and National Waterways (111 NWs, 20,187 km) are different figures. The first is the NCERT figure for navigable length. The second is the network declared under the NW Act, 2016, and only 32 of those NWs are operational [2].
• Backwater (kayal) and creek: a backwater is a quiet lagoon running parallel to the coast (Kerala). A creek is a narrow arm of the sea cutting into the coast (Maharashtra, Gujarat).
• Canalised waterway and canal: a canalised waterway is a natural river made calmer with locks and dams (Ganga at Farakka). A canal is dug by people (West Coast Canal, Buckingham Canal).

Prelims Hooks

• Length order of the original NWs: NW-1 (1,620 km) > NW-4 (1,078 km) > NW-2 (891 km) > NW-5 (588 km) > NW-3 (205 km). Trap: NW-4 is longer than NW-2.
• NW-1 sections, east to west: Haldia–Farakka 560 km → Farakka–Patna 460 km → Patna–Prayagraj 600 km.
• NW Act, 2016: 111 NWs = 5 old + 106 new, covering 20,187 km in 23 states + 4 UTs. 32 were operational as of March 2026 [2].
• IWAI: set up in 1986 under the IWAI Act, 1985. It works under the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways and is headquartered in Noida [2].
• Match the waterway to its NW number: Barak = NW-16, Sundarbans = NW-97, Mandovi = NW-68, Zuari = NW-111, Cumberjua = NW-27 [2].
• JMVP is World Bank-aided and covers Varanasi–Haldia. Its multimodal terminals are at Varanasi (UP), Sahibganj (Jharkhand) and Haldia (WB) [2].

Mains Points

• Why waterways declined, and what problems remain (GS-I/III):
• Railways (from 1853) and roads gave faster, all-season transport.
• Barrages and irrigation canals took water out of the rivers, so stretches became shallow, silted and non-navigable. The share of traffic fell to about 1% (NCERT), and it is about 2% today [2].

• Problems that remain: low dry-season depth beyond Patna, heavy siltation on the Brahmaputra, pontoon and low bridges that block vessels, few return cargoes, and the risk that dredging harms the Gangetic dolphin's habitat.

• Why they are being revived (GS-III, infrastructure and environment):

• They are the cheapest, lowest-carbon mode and best suited to bulk cargo. Over 68% of NW cargo is coal, ores, sand and fly ash [3].
• Support now comes from the NW Act 2016, JMVP, the Jalvahak scheme and NW-5 for the Talcher–Paradip mineral belt. These tie into Sagarmala and PM Gati Shakti multimodal planning.

• Targets: over 200 MMT by 2030 (Maritime India Vision 2030) and over 500 MMT by 2047 [2][3]. The Harit Nauka guidelines aim to make 100% of inland vessels green by 2047 [2].

• Strategy for the North-East (GS-II/III):

• The Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route (1972), NW-2, NW-16 and the Kaladan project give this landlocked region a route to the sea that does not depend on the narrow Siliguri Corridor.
• The Jalvahak scheme (15 December 2024) pays back up to 35% of operating cost for scheduled cargo on NW-1, NW-2 and NW-16 via this route [2].
• Cross-border river trade also builds ties with Bangladesh.

Related concepts

• Inland Waterways Authority of India
• National Waterways Act 2016
• National Waterway 1
• National Waterway 2
• National Waterway 3
• National Waterway 4
• National Waterway 5
• Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route

Read more

• Inland waterways and the national waterways