The Haldia Dock Complex (HDC) also popularly known as Haldia Port is a docking facility on the Hooghly River in Haldia, West Bengal, India. It is one of the two dock systems under the Syama Prasad Mookerjee Port, Kolkata, with the other being the Kolkata Dock System (KDS). The facility specializes in handling dry and liquid bulk cargo. It is located about from the sandheads–deep sea area of the Bay of Bengal, upstream from Pilotage Station at Sagar and 104 km (65 mi) downstream of Kolkata. In 1968, an oil jetty was commissioned at Haldia, and officially in 1977 the dock facility of Haldia started functioning.
It consists of a dock enclosed by lock and riverside jetties. The dock have container terminal, dry cargo terminal and bulk cargo terminal, and river jetties mainly handle liquid products. The dock is mainly handles fully loaded Handy size (not Handymax)–carriers of 28,000–40,000 deadweight tonnage (DWT)–vessels. It has a maximum draft depth of and can accommodate Panamax vessels up to long with cargoes of 40 to 50 percent of its capacity. The dock operates floating crane facilities at the deep drafted anchorages located at Sagar and sandheads to accommodate large vessels for discharging bulk cargoes, liquid products are discharged in the Sandheads through Ship-to-ship cargo transfer.
The Haldia Dock Complex support the hinterland of Central, East and Northeast India. It mainly transports bulk cargoes; handled 51.855 million metric tonnes of cargoes in the 2025–26 financial year. It also handled over 0.22 million (2.2 lakh) TEUs containers in 2025–26. The Shyamaprasad Mukherjee Port (Kolkata) handles most of the cargoes through the Port.
Location and meteorology Haldia Dock Complex is eight meters above sea level and is located at 21.20 north and 88.06 east. It is north of Paradip Port by sea and river route, and south of Kolkata Dock System by river route. The dock is situated about north of the deep sea (Sandhead) and inland from the Bay of Bengal by river. It is developed on the western bank of the Hooghly River at the confluence of the Hooghly and Haldi rivers in the Tamluk subdivision of Purba Medinipur district in the southern part of the state of West Bengal in eastern India.
The Haldia Dock Complex is located on the eastern coast of India in the Lower Gangetic Plain which is part of a flat plain known as the Gangetic Plain; the land slope is fairly flat. Haldia has seasonal temperature variations; April and May are the warmest months, while December and January are the coldest months. The highest temperature recorded so far is 44.90°C (May) and the lowest temperature is 6.90°C (December), which was recorded in 1975. The dock area receives most of its seasonal rainfall from the southwest monsoon from June to September, with an average rainfall of 250 mm. Occasionally, cyclones formed in the Bay of Bengal hit the coast. Average monthly rainfall is less than 50 mm from November to February under the influence of northwest monsoon.
It is situated on alluvial plain, mainly formed from silt carried by the Hooghly and Haldi rivers. The area surrounding the dock falls under Seismic Zone III indicating a moderate risk of earthquakes. As there is no natural harbour, the dock is constructed by excavating the land along the river. The maximum depth is up to and the soil in the dock entrance basin is mainly composed of silt. Visibility in the harbor area is good throughout the year and low visibility is usually associated with heavy rains caused by the southwest monsoon. On average, there are five to seven morning fogs every month from November to February.
History Background The Kolkata Dock System was unable to handle large sea-going vessels due to the low navigability of the navigable channel of the century-old Port of Kolkata under Kolkata Port Trust. This inability threatened the economy of Kolkata and eastern India. Port of Kolkata had been facing navigability problems for long due to silting and submerged sandbar, and an alternative route was needed for shipping, which led the Government of West Bengal to consider the possibility of establishing a subsidiary dock of Kolkata Dock System.
In the 1950s, the search was on for a suitable location for a dock near the estuary of the Hooghly River, which would not pose navigational problems and would provide sufficient draft for larger ships. Among the various possible sites, Geonkhali, south of Kolkata, was a serious contender for Haldia. Jeonkhali had draft all-round the year, and was able to accommodate ships over long.
In 1959, The Haldia Project Report was prepared by Rendell Palmer Triton (RPT), a UK-based port consultant. Haldia had draft of for all days, for 238 days and for 39 days in a year. It was expected that with dredging and river training works, the navigability would increase and by 1985, 80,000 DWT ships would be able to come to Haldia. The Barauni refinery was set up in Bihar in the 1960s, an immediate need for an oil jetty was felt to import crude oil and petroleum products, the main raw materials required for the refinery, which fueled plans to build a new port.
Calcutta Port Commissioners: Till 1975 In the initial period, the then Chief Minister Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy selected Geonkhali as a suitable location for setting up a satellite port of Kolkata and planned to connect it with Kolaghat through rail connectivity for improved transportation. Despite various efforts by the Government of West Bengal, the Geonkhali project was not implemented but Haldia on the right bank of the river was alternatively selected as the subsidiary port of Kolkata. It was located in relatively more navigable waterways, and was closer to the sea than the proposed Geonkhali area; in addition, there were only three submerged sandbars in fairly straight waterways and shipping channel. In 1959, the project report for the new port was prepared but was delayed due to some technical problems. The master plan envisaged the construction of a Trishula shaped dock included two entrances with lock, 47 berths, two oil jetties on the river bank and two large dry docks. Posthuma, DG of the Port of Rotterdam, who advised the Government of India on the development of the country's ports, was involved in the outline of the Haldia project; dutch hydrologist Jansen, who examined river regimes. The port engineering aspect was overseen by the internationally renowned French harbor engineer Larras.
Due to its proximity to the Bay of Bengal, Haldia was designed in the early 1960s to accommodate large ships. In the late 1960s, the Haldia was first developed as a river port. Construction for the dock began in 1967. In the first phase, only 7 berths and a single oil jetty were taken under construction. The need for an oil jetty at Haldia arose in the mid-1960s, as the Barauni refinery, established in 1964 with the help of the Soviet Union, needed to be serviced by tankers through the nearest port. Construction of the first oil jetty began in 1965, which was completed in 1968 with a pipeline connecting it to the Barauni refinery. On 12 August 1968, the oil jetty began operations with the loading of 6,500T of motor oil on the IOC-chartered tanker Ampuria; motor spirit was transported from Barauni refinery.
In 1966, Calcutta Port Commissioners entrusted dredging work under Haldia project to Ivan Milutinnovic – PIM; the company had successfully completed dredging for the Paradip port project. ₹2.86 crore was paid to the company under the dredging contract. The contract involved the dredging of 1.5 million cubic meters of silt in front of the oil jetty, at approaches to the lock-gate and the dock. The dredged silt was deposited in low-lying land near the docks. The dredging work was supposed to start in 1966 and finish in 1969, but the dredgers of the Dutch company were deployed from 1973 to 1975. The daily rent for dredging was fixed at ₹1.49 lakh. The Dredger Ham-308 was deployed at Auckland (a submerged sandbars on the Hooghly River) and the Dredger Delta Bay at Middleton (another Submerged Sandbars on the Hooghly River). The proposed estimate was that dredging 76 million cubic meters of sediment would provide of navigability for 320 days a year, and dredging 30 million cubic meters of sediment would provide 10.67 m of navigability throughout the year.
Calcutta Port Trust: 1975–present Finally in 1977, the port gained momentum with the opening of the Haldia Dock Complex. Haldia Dock Complex, a modern dock complex of Kolkata Port Trust, was set up in 1977 to handle larger vessels, carrying bulk cargo with optimum economy. Cargo projection for the first financial year (1975-76) at Haldia Dock Complex was 21 million metric tonnes, which is 2.5 times more than the Kolkata dock system.
The Dutch dredging company had dredged 50 million cubic meters of silt up to 1977, at a total cost of ₹26 crore. By 1978, the total amount of dredging was 82 million cubic metres, including 50 million cubic meters at Auckland, 21 million cubic meters at Jellingham and 11 million cubic meters at Midleton. However, despite dredging above the estimated value, the improvement in navigability was not consistent. The Haldia project was designed for a draft of , but even after more dredging than required, the draft did not exceed . As a result, capital dredging has stopped; later dredging continued only for channel maintenance.
Later, the Haldia city and the Haldia Industrial Belt were developed around the port. The import of crude oil through the port began in the 1960s, leading Haldia to develop into the first petrochemical hub of West Bengal and the entire eastern India in the following decades. Thus, long before the economic liberalisation was adopted by the Government of India in the early 1990s, the Haldia dock and industrial area became an oasis for private entrepreneurs and foreign capital.
The port's navigable channel faced a navigability crisis in the late 2000s, which affected the port's normal shipping operations. The navigability crisis mainly occurred at the Jellingham and Auckland sandbars in the port's channel. The ideal navigable depth at these two locations was and respectively at zero tide. A survey conducted in October 2008 by the Kolkata Port Trust showed that the depth at the two locations had decreased to and respectively. To address the navigability crisis, the port authority conducted a survey in 2011 to introduce Eden channel as an alternative channel to Lower Auckland. The Eden channel was fully opened in 2016, which is deeper than Lower Auckland; depth of its shallow part is at zero tide.
Factors such as navigable crisis in the channel, dependence on tides and lockgate for shipping led to a rapid decline in cargo volume at Haldia Dock since 2009. Vessel movement at the dock occurs only during high tide, which occurs twice a day, causing port users to shift to other east-coast deep-water ports in India. In March 2018, The Kolkata Port Trust launched a floating jetty known as the Haldia Floating Terminal under the Haldia Dock Complex, which completely ending the dependence on the lock-gate. It is capable of discharging cargo from 10-12 thousand DWT barges/mini bulk carriers; the annual capacity is 4 million metric tons. From the mid-2010s, it is planned to end the dependence on lock-gate and dock for handling liquid cargo vessels to increase the port's cargo handling. A decision was taken to shift the liquid cargo unloading facility operated within the dock to the river bank. The construction of Outer Terminal-2 started on 5 September 2019 with a target of opening in 2021, but the global COVID-19 pandemic including in West Bengal in 2020 delayed the construction. It was finally commissioned on 23 March 2022.
Dock system Outside lock gate Oil jetty