Cabinet Approves the Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority: One Planner for Roads, Rail, Ports and Airports
The Union Cabinet approved a proposal to set up the Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority (ITLA). It will be set up as a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV), which means a separate body created for one clear job.
ITLA will be the national top-level (apex) body for planning transport and logistics (the business of moving and storing goods) across all modes together.
Its main task is to prepare a National Transport Master Plan with a planning period of 10 years or more. The plan will cover roads, railways, ports and shipping, civil aviation, inland waterways, coastal shipping, urban mobility and logistics.
ITLA will do a technical appraisal (a careful expert check) of Central government infrastructure projects costing ₹500 crore or more. It will also track their progress and judge their impact after they are completed.
It will review the five-year and annual plans of the different transport ministries, so that each ministry's plan fits the long-term national plan.
It will build a National Transport Data Repository using data from GSTN e-way bills, FASTag, Vahan (the vehicle registration database), GPS platforms and city traffic systems. This will help study how goods and people move from one place to another.
Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority (ITLA)
The Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority (ITLA) is a central government body that plans India's transport system as one connected network. Today, roads, railways, ports and airports are each handled by a different ministry. ITLA looks at all of them together, like one architect planning a whole house instead of separate workers each building one room.
The Cabinet decision creates this body. It is meant to fix a long-standing problem: many transport ministries and agencies planning separately, which leads to gaps, delays and higher costs.
PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan
The PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan is a digital, map-based platform that puts the government's infrastructure plans on one screen. Roads, railways, ports, gas pipelines, power lines and many other layers are shown together on a map of India. This helps ministries see where their projects meet or clash before they start building.
Gati Shakti gives the shared map and the project checks; ITLA adds a long-term master plan, a full data repository and checks after projects are finished. Both use the same ₹500 crore mark, so how their roles fit together is something to watch.
National Logistics Policy, 2022
The National Logistics Policy (NLP) is the government's plan to make moving goods across India cheaper, faster and more reliable. Gati Shakti deals with building the physical "hardware" (roads, rail lines, ports). The NLP deals with the "software": rules, processes, digital systems, skills and standards.
ITLA is meant to support the review of the National Logistics Policy. Its data repository serves the policy's third goal: making transport decisions using real data.
- New body: Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority (ITLA), set up as a Special Purpose Vehicle
- National Transport Master Plan: planning horizon of 10 years or more
- Appraisal threshold: Central infrastructure projects of ₹500 crore or more
- Modes covered: road, rail, ports and shipping, civil aviation, inland waterways, coastal shipping, urban mobility and logistics
- Data sources for the National Transport Data Repository: GSTN e-way bills, FASTag, Vahan, GPS platforms, urban traffic systems
- PM Gati Shakti launched: 13 October 2021; National Logistics Policy launched: 17 September 2022
- NLP target: top 25 in the World Bank LPI by 2030