Examine how inland water transport can help India decarbonise logistics, with special reference to the North-East.

Moving a tonne of freight by water costs about one-third of road and half of rail, and it emits a fraction of road's carbon [1]. Inland cargo reached 218 MMT in 2025–26, which is more than the Maritime India Vision 2030 target [1]. Waterways can therefore cut emissions from logistics, as long as depth, transport links and river ecology are managed well.

How inland water transport decarbonises logistics

• Modal shift: barges take freight off trucks, so each tonne moved uses less fuel and highways are less crowded [1].
• Large untapped potential: waterways carry only ~2% of India's freight, against 14% in China and 48% in Vietnam. India's target is 5% by 2030 [4].
• Smarter navigation: thalweg surveys, Least Available Depth (LAD) reporting and digital depth and weather platforms let vessels carry fuller loads and make fewer wasted trips [1].
• Multimodal planning: the parliamentary committee wants rail, road and port links planned from the start, which matches PM Gati Shakti [4].

Special reference to the North-East

• Geography: hilly terrain makes roads and railways costly to build, so the Brahmaputra (NW-2) is a natural freight corridor [2].
• NW-2 momentum: cargo grew 53% in 2024–25. India's first riverine lighthouses at Bogibeel, Pandu, Silghat and Biswanath Ghat (~₹84 crore) will allow safe navigation at night [2].
• Feeder waterways: Kopili (NW-57) carried its first load, 300 MT of cement [3].
• Route to the sea: the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol route is covered by thalweg monitoring, giving the region a waterway link to the sea [1].

Constraints on the green promise

• Depth and vessels: shallow channels and too few inland vessels hold freight back [5]. Because the Brahmaputra is braided and silt-heavy, dredging has to be repeated.
• Ecology: dredging on NW-1 disturbed Gangetic dolphins [4], so waterways are "green" only if dredging is kept to what is needed.
• Implementation gap: only 32 of 111 National Waterways are operational [1].

Inland waterways can cut carbon cheaply, and the North-East stands to gain most because land routes there are hard to build. The way forward is to fund dredging as a national asset [5], carry out environmental studies before developing a waterway, and give shippers incentives to switch [4]. Developing waterways selectively in this way supports India's net-zero goal and SDG 9 and SDG 13.