The project for the development of maritime communication between Vladivostok and the port of Chennai, which Russia and India agreed on back in 2019, has stalled. As Kommersant learned, the head of the Ministry of Transport, Andrei Nikitin, notified Russian President Vladimir Putin about the lack of interest of Russian operators. Vladivostok does not have the capacity to transship the oil, LNG and fertilizers India needs; to develop the route, its connection with the Trans-Arctic Transport Corridor is now being considered.
Russian transport companies were not interested in organizing transportation along the route from Vladivostok to the Indian port of Chennai. As sources told Kommersant, the head of the Ministry of Transport, Andrei Nikitin, announced this in a letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin at the end of May.
According to Kommersant’s interlocutors, the lack of business interest in the Ministry of Transport is explained by the fact that the port of Vladivostok does not have terminals for transshipment of oil, LNG and fertilizers, in which India is interested.
The Ministry of Transport did not answer Kommersant’s questions. Presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov did not comment on the topic.
An agreement on the development of maritime communications between Vladivostok and Chennai was signed in 2019 on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in the presence of Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The length of the route is more than 10 thousand km. In 2024, the then deputy head of the Ministry of Eastern Development Anatoly Bobrakov noted that the Vladivostok-Chennai sea line could be used to transport coal, oil, LNG, fertilizers, containers, and the route would reduce the delivery time of goods from India to Russia by 16 days compared to the route through the Suez Canal, to 24 days.
India is one of the largest importers of Russian oil, coal and fertilizers. According to the country’s Ministry of Industry and Trade, in the 2025/26 financial year (April 1 – March 31), imports from Russia decreased by 13.2% year-on-year, to $55.36 billion, Indian exports to the Russian Federation decreased by 7.9%, to $4.49 billion. The total trade turnover of the two countries fell by 12.8%, to $59.86 billion.
Chennai Port is one of the 12 key seaports in India. Located on the east coast of the country. In the 2025/26 financial year, the port authority said, Chennai’s cargo throughput grew by 5.35% to 57.9 million tonnes, an all-time high. In particular, container transportation increased by 6.59%, to 1.94 million TEU, oil – by 11.17%, to 11.45 million tons. The port also has facilities for transporting cars, grain, etc.
The port of Vladivostok is the largest universal port in the Far East, with an annual cargo turnover of more than 12.9 million tons. The main external lines are China, South Korea and other countries in the Asia-Pacific region, according to the website of FESCO, which owns the port. It has terminals for the transportation of general cargo, including metal products, cars, petroleum products, and containers.
FESCO assured Kommersant that the Indian direction is one of the most important for the company. “We operate three services between countries that connect the Russian ports of Novorossiysk, St. Petersburg and Vladivostok with the largest Indian ports – Nava Sheva and Mundra,” they say. In addition, the company says, Indian ports act as transshipment points on FESCO routes in the Indian Ocean. FESCO clarified that they plan to develop the Indian direction “taking into account the interest of customers and trends in international logistics.”
According to Kommersant’s sources, despite the current lack of interest of Russian operators in transportation on the Vladivostok-Chennai route, options for the development of this project are being considered.
Thus, according to Kommersant’s interlocutors, Rosatom supports the idea of possibly connecting the Vladivostok-Chennai route with the Trans-Arctic Transport Corridor. As Kommersant sources explain, thus, cargo turnover with the port of Chennai in the future can be ensured by cargo from the ports of the North-West and the Arctic zone of Russia. In addition, Kommersant’s interlocutors continue, the issue of organizing transportation between Russia and India along the Northern Sea Route is being explored. Rosatom did not provide comments.
General Director of Infoline-Analytics Mikhail Burmistrov believes that the Vladivostok-Chennai project was not a mistake in 2019. According to him, it looked like an ambitious, logical attempt to link the Far East to growing Indian demand and optimize some routes. But, the expert adds, the market has become fundamentally different during this time: India is interested in supplies from Russia of oil, LNG, coking and thermal coal, and fertilizers, which require infrastructure. India, in the context of the current imbalance in trade and the inconvertibility of the rupee, is looking for opportunities to sharply increase supplies of consumer and industrial goods to Russia, he adds.
According to Mr. Burmistrov, in the current conditions, connecting with the Trans-Arctic Transport Corridor looks like the only opportunity to save the project, albeit with an updated concept. He draws attention to the fact that since 2019, not only Russia’s trade with India has changed radically, but also the risks associated with the detention or damage of ships transporting Russian raw materials have increased sharply. As a result, the expert points out, the Northern Sea Route not only reduces the distance, but also fundamentally increases the security of exports, especially raw materials.
