Assam Inland Water Transport was established in the year 1958. The department of Transport, Govt of Assam is the Administrative department of Inland Water Transport, Assam. The Directorate of Inland Water Transport, Assam was initially setup with a skeleton staff headed by a Director with its Head Quarter at Shillong. The tiny department started its services with a few nos. of ferry Ghats taken over from PWD.

The department had worked hard to serve the people of Assam and its adjoining neighbouring states. In October, 1963 the Directorate of Inland Water Transport was shifted to Guwahati. This was slowly expanded to a fully fledged Directorate under the Transport Department, Govt. of Assam at Guwahati. As a first major steps toward its expansion activity, 6 (six ) nos. of ferry  services operating in the river Brahmaputra were taken over from the State PWD Department in 1968 . Since then, the Directorate of Inland Water Transport has never looked back. The wooden country boats which were plying in the services were gradually withdrawn and were replaced with power vessels.