A move is afoot to bar foreign vessels from coastal trade on the domestic waters amid growing security concerns over coastline security.
"The Ministry of Shipping has finalised a draft note for a stringent cabotage law to prohibit foreign ships and those manned by foreigners from doing coastal trade in view of the highly sensitive coastline and rising security threats," a senior Shipping Ministry official told PTI here today.
"We want to reduce the presence of foreign vessels on our coastlines and have sought legal position from the Law Ministry, besides consulting other departments," the official added.
At present, foreign ships moving from one port to the other along the country's coastline results in foreigners getting strategic information about the movements, habitations, nature of coasts between two ports and other details, the official explained.
Cabotage refers to the transport of goods or passengers between two points in the same country and cabotage regulations are made in view of national security and public safety.
The move, if approved by the Cabinet, would also result in more opportunities for domestic ships to tide over the global economic meltdown by getting the opportunity to do entire coastal trade, the official said.
When asked whether the country has enough carriers to carry the trade, the official said, "We intend to build up the capacity for supply vessels in a year or two. We have enough oil tankers but lack in bulk dry carriers and dredgers."