VARANASI: The Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) is working towards facilitating safe passenger movements for Kumbh-Mela scheduled to be held at Sangam, Allahabad (Prayagraj) from January 15 to March 15.The IWAI has already set up four floating terminals, one each at Kilaghat, Saraswati Ghat, Naini Bridge and Sujawan Ghat. Further, two vessels — CL Kasturba and SL Kamla — will be deployed for pilgrim movement, said IWAI spokesperson Deevakar Anand He added that a fairway with navigational aids will be maintained between Allahabad and Varanasi with targeted least available depth (LAD) of 1.0 m. Five temporary jetties at Chatnag, Sirsa, Sitamarhi, Vindhyachal and Chunar have also been set up for embarkment and dis-embarkment of passengers.IWAI has the mandate to provide safe and efficient mode of transport through Inland navigation. As a part of development of NW-1 (Allahabad to Haldia) IWAI is making substantial interventions to make the Allahabad -Varanasi stretch of river Ganga navigable . In this regard, IWAI is working on providing a sufficient draft of 1.0 m for the entire channel in river Ganga between Allahabad and Varanasi. This will ensure seamless and safe movement of vessels.Recently, the country’s first multi-modal terminal (MMT) on Ganga built by IWAI at Ramnagar was inaugurated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 12.The MMT was built at the cost Rs. 169.59 crore under Jal Marg Vikas project, a Rs 5,369 crore World Bank-aided project on National Waterway 1 that aims at augmenting the navigational capacity of the Varanasi to Haldia stretch of the river to enable commercial navigation of at least 1500-2000 ton vessels.

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