NEW DELHI: Parliament today gave nod to a bill to convert 111 rivers across the country into National Waterways, a move that would boost movement of goods and passengers via rivers and expectedly reduce the transportation costs substantially.The National Waterways Bill was passed by Rajya Sabha today. The Lok Sabha had approved the bill last year.The bill provides for enacting a central legislation to declare 106 additional inland waterways as the national waterways in addition to five existing national waterways.Allaying fears of the state governments that the new law will infringe upon their rights, Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari said the passage of the much-awaited Bill will infact boost the maritime trade of the states and augment their economy."The declaration of National Waterways does not restrict the rights of state governments in any way. It only facilitates Government of India in developing the waterway for shipping and navigation. It will not infringe upon their rights on minerals and water etc," Gadkari said.Justifying the measure, he regretted that the waterways had taken a backseat in India, with only 3.5 per cent of trade being done through the mode here as against 47 per cent in China, 40 per cent in Europe, 44 per cent in Japan and Korea and 35 per cent in Bangaladesh."Inland Water Transport is an environment-friendly and cost-effective mode of transporation, which on development will have the potential to establish an optimal modal mix and reduce logistic cost," he said.He said logistic cost was as high as 18 per cent in India and an industrialist had rightly pointed out to the Prime Minister that transporting things from Mumbai to London was less expensive and easy in comparison to transportation to Delhi from Mumbai.Responding to contention by some members that these were here tall claims, the Minister asserted, "I do not make any announcement in the air... I promise if any of my announcements is not fulfilled, I will apologise in this House....You may even bring a Privilege Motion against me if my promise is not fulfilled."When Deputy Chairman P J Kurien asked him to refrain from throwing such a challenge, Gadkari said, "I am 100 per cent ready.. We have already signed contracts worth Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the road sector. I am not dependent on budget."