Chennai port codes
The Indian port code list places 3 customs locations at Chennai, a city also written Madras, and each one carries its own code. The last character is what separates them.
Every Chennai port code
The name column is the readable form. Where the list writes the location differently, its own string is shown in brackets after it, because that is the string a shipping bill or an eBRC filing will show you.
| Code | Location | Facility |
|---|---|---|
| INMAA1 | Chennai sea port (CHENNAI SEA) | Sea Port |
| INMAA4 | Chennai air cargo (CHENNAI AIR CARGO ACC) | Airport |
| INTLT6 | L&T SBL L&T Chennai | ICD or CFS |
Why one city has several codes
An Indian port code follows the UN/LOCODE shape: the two letter country code IN, then a three character location, then one character for the facility type. 1 is a sea port, 2 rail, 4 an airport, 6 an ICD or CFS, and B a land customs station. A sea terminal and an air cargo terminal in the same city are two different customs locations, so they carry two different codes.
Chennai covers 3 facility types: Sea Port, Airport, ICD or CFS. The codes above sit across 2 location prefixes: MAA, TLT, because a facility serving a city is a location in its own right rather than a suffix on the city's port.
Where the code is used
The port code identifies where a consignment was cleared, and it travels with the export: it is on the shipping bill, and it is one of the fields carried into an eBRC filing when the remittance is mapped to that shipping bill. A wrong one is in the same family of refusals as a wrong purpose code or currency code. If you are filing against a shipping bill for the first time, the step by step on the DGFT portal shows where these fields land, and the full guide covers what the certificate does with them.