The Sethusamudram Ship Canal Project

By Vice Adm (Retd) GM Hiranandani

(February 16, New Delhi, Sri Lanka Guardian) At present, ships transiting between the coasts of India have to go all the way around Sri Lanka because of a reef called Adam’s Bridge at Pamban, near Rameswaram Island. At Pamban, the depth of water is 11 feet.

This canal was first proposed in 1860 by a British officer of the Royal Indian Navy, then known as the Indian Marine. He proposed cutting a ship canal called the Sethusamudram Ship Canal through Rameswaram Island that would reduce the steaming distances between the west and east coasts and take advantage of navigation along the coast.

In effect, the concept proposed linking the Gulf of Mannar on India’s west coast with the Palk Bay on India’s east coast by creating a shipping canal which would provide a continuous navigable sea route around the Indian Peninsula, instead of having to go all the way around Sri Lanka.

In practical terms, the advantages of the canal were that the distance between Cape Comorin and Chennai would be reduced to 402 nautical miles from the prevailing 755 miles. Further, by reducing the distance between the east and the west coasts, travelling time would come down by 36 hours. It would also avoid circumnavigation of ships around Sri Lanka, thereby resulting in savings in fuel costs. The canal would help make two-way coastal shipping operations between the east and west coasts more competitive.

In 1955, the Government constituted the Sethusamudram Project Committee under Sir Ramaswamy Mudaliar to examine the feasibility and desirability of connecting the Gulf of Mannar with the Palk Bay and its impact on the port of Tuticorin.

The committee recommended that the canal project be linked to the Tuticorin Harbour Project and that both projects be undertaken simultaneously with a view to spur industrial and overall development of then under-developed southern part of Tamil Nadu.

In 1963, the government sanctioned only the Tuticorin project.

The Present Scope of the Sethusamudram Ship Canal Project

The present, project envisages the creation of a 167 km long, 800 metres wide, two-way channel between the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, (starting near Tuticorin) more or less parallel to the Indo-Sri Lankan maritime boundary, within India’s territorial waters. It involves initial capital dredging and subsequent periodic maintenance dredging of a 12 metre deep canal across Rameshwaram Island and the shallow narrow waters between the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait.

It had been assessed as economically viable (1200 to 1500 crores at 1996 prices) and technically feasible (India’s Dredging Corpoeation now has adequate dredging capacity, experience and expertise). In 1999, the Defence Minister announced in Rameshwaram that from the funding aspect, the project could be launched jointly between the Central and Tamil Nadu governments as the Sethusamudram Corporation, as had been done for the Konkan Railway Corporation.

The greatest beneficiary of the project was envisaged to be Tuticorin Port, which had the long term potential to transform into a container transhipment hub like Singapore and Colombo. The canal project was also expected to foster the development of the proposed 13 minor ports in Tamil Nadu.

The Security Aspect

Sri Lanka is separated from the Indian peninsula by a 35 kilometres long string of islets known as Adam’s Bridge. The Palk Strait, in which the Adam’s Bridge is located, is shallow, where only small craft can operate. Jaffna, the LTTE stronghold in northern Sri Lanka is just 30 kilometres from the Tamil Nadu coast.

In the negotiations between the LTTE representatives and the Indian interlocutors prior to the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord of 1987, the LTTE had sought for their ‘Sea Tigers’ the unfettered right to police the sea-lanes in the vicinity of India’s coastline. They proposed the delineation of “distinct naval boundaries” - each area being under the control of the LTTE and the Sri Lankan Navy respectively.

At that time, India had categorically rejected the LTTE’s suggestion, not only because it would undermine Sri Lanka’s authority but also because it would be tantamount to permitting a terrorist outfit to be treated as a legitimate force patrolling the seas adjacent to India’s coastline.

In the peace negotiations between the LTTE and the Sri Lanka Government in 2003, the LTTE reiterated this demand and also claimed its right to have an Exclusive Economic Zone.

In January 2004, the Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis hosted the 6th Asian Security Conference in Delhi. In his speech, Mr Lakshman Kadirgamar, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs and at that time Senior Adviser on Foreign Affairs to the President of Sri Lanka, stated:

“It is probably correct that no other internal ethnic conflict has spawned a new (LTTE) Navy, replete with surface to surface missiles, fast attack craft and suicide boats laden with explosives which has fought a State Navy (i.e. Sri Lankan Navy) for domination of certain parts of the ocean and poses indirectly, if not directly at the moment, a potentially serious threat to international shipping, the security of an adjoining State - India - and a renowned natural harbour - Trincomalee.

“Ever since the mission of the Indian Peace Keeping Force ended unsatisfactorily in 1990, India has maintained a studied aloofness from any further involvement in the Sri Lankan problem. But it is becoming clear that this period of disengagement cannot go on indefinitely….an LTTE military build up especially around Trincomalee harbour on the East Coast of Sri Lanka has taken place over the last two years of the ceasefire and the build up of the LTTE’s Navy in addition to the growth of its armoury of weapons poses a potential threat to the southern flank of India.”

Hope on the project was revived in January 1999 when NDA Defence Minister Fernandes announced that the NDA government would complete the digging of the Sethu Samudram channel in three years. This was backed by the then Prime Minister’s assurance that the NDA government was committed to the project. Indeed, the government took a concrete step towards the execution of the project when the NDA Finance Minister, in his 2000-01 Budget, allocated Rs 4.8 crore for a fresh feasibility study of the project. Recently, following a directive from the Union Ministry of Shipping, the Tuticorin Port Trust invited tenders for undertaking a feasibility-cum-environment study for the project.

The concept of the project has been opposed by several fraternities.

Contentious Issues that Await Resolution

Environmental activists have adduced evidence that:

* Dredging and dumping of dredged material will be catastrophic for the eco-system.

* The Gulf of Mannar is a biologically diverse coastal region and has been declared a Marine Reserve. The reserve is 180 kilometres long and 10 kilometres wide and encompasses 21 islands along the coast. It is the first marine biosphere reserve in South and Southeast Asia. It has the largest remaining beds and varieties of sea grass which in turn are the feeding grounds for endangered species - dugongs and five species of sea turtles.

* There is concern that the churning of the sediment by dredgers will smother over a hundred species of living coral reefs and generally destroy the fragile marine eco-balance of the area.

* There is concern also that the oil and marine pollution associated with shipping traffic will aggravate the ecological stress already being caused by the effluents released into the Gulf of Mannar by nearby Tuticorin’s chemical industries and the ash of its thermal power plant.

* The project will impact the fishing resources of the Gulf of Mannar.

* Human Rights activists have adduced statistics that several thousand families spread over five districts of Tamil Nadu earn their livelihood from fishing. The canal would disrupt the livelihood of thousands of fishermen and their families.

* Within Tamil Nadu, political factions are divided over the project. Indeed the ups and downs of the project have got linked with whether the Tamil Nadu faction constituting the State Government is in coalition with the political party constituting the Central Government in Delhi.

* Successive committees have revised the cost of the project upwards. In 1994, the Tamil Nadu government appointed the Pallavan Transport Consultancy Services Ltd in Chennai to appraise and revalidate a 1983 report. The new report, submitted in March 1996, further revised the project cost to Rs 760 crore for a canal deep enough for ships of 31 foot draft.

Sri Lankan views are similarly divided. In one view, reviving maritime activity in the Palk Strait will benefit the economy of Northern Sri Lanka and the opposite view is that disturbance of the ecosystem would endanger the livelihood of Sri Lankan fishermen.

In recent months, the controversy has widened by religious activists who consider it sacrilegious to cut through / destroy / damage the Ram Setu, described in the sacred epic Ramayan, as having been built by Maryada Purushottam Rama and his Vanara Army to cross over “dry-shod” into Lanka to rescue Sita from Ravana. The heat of the debate has increased when questions are asked whether there is any factual evidence that Ram ever existed?.

With elections imminent at the Central and State Government levels, it has become prudent to cool the debate.

The Government has constituted a panel of experts headed by the renowned and recent Nobel Prize awardee Dr. R K Pachauri of The Environment Research Institute (TERI) to examine whether an alternative alignment is feasible.

On 08 Aug an article appeared in the Asian Age titled “Sethu Project: A White Elephant in the Making”. Its author is a Vice Admiral who was Director General of the Coast Guard before he took over as Flag Officer Commanding in Chief of the Eastern Naval Command from where he retired a few months ago. The substantive points raised in his article are:

* “What are the security threats that the ships transiting the Sethusamudram Canal are likely to face? The LTTE has shown enormous ingenuity and fanatical determination when employing its 3,000-strong “Sea Tigers” and the smaller but suicidal “Black Sea Tigers” in seaborne attacks not far from the proposed Canal Project site. In addition, the LTTE has frequently used crude sea-mines to disrupt Sri Lankan shipping on its east coast. LTTE’s “Air Tigers” have used modified Czech-made light aircraft to carry out reasonably-accurate night bombing attacks on Sri Lankan airports. The Canal Project area falls within strike range of these aircraft. A ship sunk in the channel would not only result in loss of life and marine pollution, but also block the channel for a prolonged period. In case of a ship being hit by a sea- mine, the Navy would need to clear the channel by mine sweeping which takes weeks.

* ”Another threat to the Canal Project would be hijacking of ships by the LTTE which could be used in terror attacks to block the Canal or ports like Tuticorin, Colombo and Chennai by sinking a ship at a strategic place. In all such cases, insurance rates will go up and ships will avoid the area, thus affecting the economics of the Project.

“Can “reasonable” security be provided for the Canal Project? The answer is yes, IF (and this is a big “IF”) funds are made available to acquire additional patrol boats, maritime and fighter aircraft, helicopters, hovercraft, mine warfare vessels and shore-based radars, along with instant communications, data link and real-time intelligence. And provided we accept the possibility of collateral damage amongst the thousands of Indian fishing boats which operate in the restricted Palk Bay area. The cost of this security cover would exceed the Rs 2,400 crore capital cost of the Canal Project.

“Given the long lead time required to recruit and train additional manpower, along with building security infrastructure, this activity should have started in 2005 so that security is in place when the Canal Project becomes operational - originally, the Canal Project was to be commissioned in 2008. There is no indication that additional security requirements have been factored in the plans.”

The timing of this article suggests that it is either to invite the Pachauri Panel’s attention to the security aspects; or that the Government decided to go ahead on the pragmatic assumption that given the delays inherent in making up even the existing shortages of manpower and in inducting new platforms, the security task would have to be undertaken from within existing resources. It could therefore be a reiteration of the need to sanction resources sooner rather than later.

From the defence point of view, whatever alternative alignment that the Pachauri Panel may suggest, the geography of this area is so restricted that it too will remain within range of LTTE malevolents, whose capability for mischief has not diminished since the late Mr Kadirgamar decribed it in 2006. And since the canal will be in Indian territorial waters and under sovereign Indian air space, its defence and security will become a logical responsibility of the Armed Forces either as a Low Intensity Conflict task or as part of the Armed Forces traditional mandate to safeguard national sovereignty from external aggression.

The Admiral’s article ends by exhorting Pachauri’s six-member panel to take a holistic view of the project, which includes security concerns raised by the Director General Coast Guard recently. These concerns have added a new dimension to the already complex discussions that range from inflamed religious beliefs to flawed comparisons with the Suez and Panama canals.

Given the Central Government’s political coalition compulsions, it would be pragmatic for the Navy and Coast Guard to prepare for taking on this additional commitment within existing resources, (until additional resources are inducted), part of which they have been doing in the Palk Bay since 1990 after the last elements of the IPKF withdrew. It is also timely for air defence aspects to be sorted out between the Air Force and the Naval Air Arm.

-Sri Lanka Guardian