On the occasion of the International Day of the Seafarers on Tuesday, the Union Minister of State (I/C) for Shipping, Mr Mansukh Mandaviya, reiterated the government’s commitment towards providing an enabling environment for the growth of seafarers in India. In a message on the occasion, the Minister said, “seafarers are unsung heroes of shipping, the industry on which everyone, everywhere relies for the goods we all need and want.” The Minister also said, “The government of India is committed to provide an enabling environment for growth of seafarers from India.”
“The shipping sector has witnessed an unprecedented growth of 35 per cent in the number of Indian seafarers employed on Indian or foreign flag vessels this year. The figure rose from 154,349 in 2017 to 208,799 in 2018. The number has doubled since 2013, when it was just 1,03,835,” he said
He further stated that this phenomenal growth in the number of Indian seafarers has been possible due to a series of measures taken by the government during the last four years to improve the standards of maritime training, increase on-board training opportunities, improve the examination and certification system and facilitate ease of doing business.
“While India has created a large capacity in imparting class-room training for Merchant Navy, there was a major constraint in providing on-board ship training for the students enrolled for class room training. However, I am glad to state that the number of students placed for on-board training has increased from 14,307 last year to 19,545 this year, showing a jump of nearly 37 per cent”, he said.
Mr Mandaviya informed that the training curriculum for the officers and the ratings were revised in 2016 not only to meet the global standards but also to meet the expectations of the foreign employers.
To regulate the training institutes working in private sector, a system of ‘Comprehensive Inspection Programme’ (CIP) was designed to assess the quality of the institute on various parameters such as infrastructure, quality of students’ intake, quality of faculty, pedagogy, performance in examination, on-board training and placement of students. An e-learning module was prepared to standardise the course material of these institutes and provided free of cost to all Indian seafarers to allow them to upgrade their knowledge and skills before appearing for the examination. To ensure increase in the supply side, a 15-year-old ban on setting up of new training institutes or increasing the capacity of the existing training institutes was lifted with certain conditions.
In addition to these, major regulatory relaxation was made in 2017 for obtaining Continuous Discharge Certificate (CDC). CDC is an identity document for a seafarer. The CDC process has also been made online. DG shipping has issued more than 70,000 CDCs under new CDC rule in 2018, said a release.
