IN Brief:
- India's Maritime State Development Council has agreed to implement One Nation One Port Process reforms across all ports by March 2027.
- Ports must integrate with the Sagar Setu Maritime Single Window, while electronic publication of port tariffs will become mandatory.
- States and Union Territories have three months to notify subordinate rules under Section 77 of the Indian Ports Act, 2025.
India’s Maritime State Development Council has agreed a March 2027 deadline for standardising administrative procedures across the country’s major and non-major ports, including the introduction of common documentation requirements and integration with a national digital maritime platform.
The decisions were taken at the council’s 21st meeting in Mumbai on 13 October 2026, chaired by Sarbananda Sonowal, Union Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways. The Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways confirmed that the One Nation One Port Process programme will be implemented across all ports by March 2027, alongside integration with the Sagar Setu Maritime Single Window.
The programme covers three connected areas: One Nation One Documentation, Port Process Re-engineering and Inter-ministerial Process Reforms. Together, they are intended to address differences in administrative requirements between ports and government departments, where shipping companies and cargo owners may otherwise encounter varying forms, procedures and approval arrangements.
India’s ports operate under different administrative structures. Major ports are governed through central arrangements, while many smaller ports fall under state maritime authorities. Applying common procedures across both groups therefore requires coordination between institutions as well as changes to their individual operating systems.
The Maritime Single Window is intended to provide a common digital route for exchanging prescribed information between the organisations involved in maritime movements. A vessel call can require documentation relating to the ship, its cargo, regulatory clearances and port operations, with information passing between agents, port authorities and government departments.
Where separate organisations require similar information through different systems, shipping agents can face repeated data entry and additional document handling. Integrating those processes can reduce duplication, provided the participating systems accept the relevant information and the underlying procedures are aligned. A shared digital interface does not automatically remove administrative differences if individual authorities continue to require separate approvals.
The council has instructed all ports to integrate with the Maritime Single Window by March 2027. It also mandated the electronic publication of port tariffs, introducing a common transparency requirement across the network. The announcement does not establish that tariff rates themselves will be standardised or that charges for comparable services will become identical between ports.
Port tariffs can cover a range of services, including vessel-related charges, cargo handling and the use of port infrastructure. Their application depends on the facility and service involved, making access to current schedules important for calculating transport costs. Electronic publication should make those charges easier to identify, while leaving the commercial and regulatory basis for individual tariffs subject to the applicable arrangements.
Implementation will also involve changes to state-level rules. The council instructed States and Union Territories to notify subordinate legislation under Section 77 of the Indian Ports Act, 2025 within three months, establishing a shorter deadline for legal and administrative work than the March 2027 target for the wider digital programme.
The council was originally established in 1997 but received statutory recognition under the Indian Ports Act, 2025, which was notified on 15 May 2026. The October meeting was its first under that framework, giving the agreed reforms a formal coordination structure involving central authorities, coastal states and maritime boards.
To support implementation, Sonowal launched a Ready Reckoner for One Nation One Port Process reforms. The guide covers major and non-major ports and references central government circulars relevant to inter-ministerial procedures. It is intended to help individual authorities apply the agreed requirements rather than developing separate approaches to the same administrative processes.
The council also endorsed priorities within the National Ports Perspective Plan and called for faster development of multimodal connections involving roads, railways, inland waterways, pipelines and conveyors. Cargo throughput at a port depends partly on these inland connections, which determine how efficiently imports can leave the terminal and exports can reach it.
Where cargo handling capacity expands faster than the connecting transport network, containers and bulk commodities can spend additional time awaiting onward movement. The council consequently urged states to prepare port master plans using a standardised template, allowing infrastructure proposals and their transport connections to be considered within a common planning framework.
States were also asked to develop port-linked industrial regions with suitable land, ready-to-use infrastructure and faster approval procedures. Locating manufacturing and processing activities near port facilities can reduce certain inland transport requirements, although the practical benefit depends on available utilities, site access, cargo characteristics and the requirements of individual industrial operations.
The meeting addressed shipbuilding finance through two new credit risk insurance products. The Shipbuilding Project Credit Risk Insurance Policy, developed by ECGC, is intended to support export projects, while the Business Credit Shield Policy–Shipbuilders, developed by New India Assurance, covers domestic projects. The government has outlined support for premiums and insurance claims as part of its wider shipbuilding programme.
These measures sit alongside the council’s adoption of objectives under Maritime India Vision 2030 and Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047, which cover port development, shipping, inland transport and related industrial activity. The more immediate One Nation One Port Process timetable provides specific milestones against which the implementation programme can be assessed.
States are expected to establish the necessary subordinate rules within three months, while common procedures and digital integration must be implemented by March 2027. The extent to which those changes reduce duplicate documentation and differences between ports will depend on how consistently individual authorities adopt the new processes.
