India’s NSB Unveils Five-Pillar Roadmap to Add 100 Ships in Five Years

The plan is aimed at addressing India’s reliance on foreign shipping lines. Shantanu Thakur, Minister of State for Ports, Shipping and Waterways, said, “India pays close to $75 billion every year in freight to foreign shipping lines, to move cargo as critical as our crude oil, our gas, our coal and our urea. That is not a performance problem for Indian shipowners, it is a competitiveness and demand-partnership problem. For India to become a Viksit Bharat by 2047, we cannot depend on the goodwill of others to secure our own trade routes. We must command our own waterline.”

The day-long event, themed “Charting the Roadmap Towards Maritime India Vision 2030 and Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047,” was held in New Delhi and brought together senior officials, shipowners, financiers and young cadets from maritime training institutes. Sagar Samvad, meaning “ocean dialogue,” carried the board’s motto as its theme line: “Wisdom in the Ocean, Progress in the Nation.”

The inaugural edition was chaired by Sarbananda Sonowal, Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, who launched the board’s first official website. Sonowal said the NSB, a statutory body constituted in 1958, was older than the ministry it advises and was created to ensure shipping policy is shaped after hearing those who sail, own and pay for shipping. He also said the re-enacted Merchant Shipping Act, 2025 and the new National Shipping Board Rules had renewed and strengthened its mandate.

Sonowal welcomed the five-point roadmap covering fiscal reform, assured cargo support, access to competitive financing, regulatory streamlining and ease of doing business. He said India is quadrupling port capacity to 10,000 million tonnes a year by 2047 and that the NSB’s task is to ensure Indian shipowners participate in that growth.

Sonowal also acknowledged the Container Manufacturing Assistance Scheme, worth ₹10,000 crore (~.05 billion), with global shipping major Maersk now ordering containers built in India.

A panel discussion titled “Augmentation of Indian Tonnage: Opportunities and Challenges” was presided over by Thakur. Panelists said flying the Indian flag remains 16 per cent to 20 per cent costlier than operating under a foreign flag, attributing the gap to India’s tax on ship imports and maintenance services, tax deducted at seafarers’ wages, tax on freight and higher domestic capital costs that foreign competitors do not carry.

The panel also said that under the sector’s Right of First Refusal mechanism, Indian owners are still expected to match foreign freight rates to win cargo. It proposed the five-pillar roadmap of fiscal reform, assured cargo support, competitive financing, regulatory streamlining and improved ease of doing business.

The measures, if adopted, could help India add 100 ships within five years and support the Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047 target of ranking amongst the world’s top five ship-owning nations, the panel argued.

A separate session on “Maritime Labour Force: Opportunities and Challenges” was chaired by Mansukh Mandaviya, Minister of Labour and Employment and Youth Affairs and Sports. The session reviewed India’s seafaring workforce, described by the board as amongst the largest in the world, against its findings on wage taxation, pension gaps and welfare provisions affecting Indian seafarers.

Mandaviya said, “India’s maritime sector has the potential to become a major engine of employment for our young workforce and position India as the world’s leading supplier of skilled seafarers.” He called for coordinated efforts among government, the maritime industry, trade bodies and training institutions to expand training capacity, strengthen market outreach for Indian seafarers, address gender disparity, develop specialised talent for cruise shipping and build skills for advanced shipbuilding.

The NSB’s five-pillar roadmap places fleet expansion, financing, regulatory reform, assured cargo and ease of doing business at the centre of India’s maritime ambitions, with the proposed addition of 100 ships within five years linked to the broader Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047 target.