Maritime safety, coastal defence train begins

The Navy will coordinate the second version of the coastal defence train on January 12 and 13. It might be undertaken alongside the whole shoreline and Exclusive Economic Zone of India.
The Navy stated Sea Vigil 2021, a biennial train that started in January 2019, “will be undertaken along the entire 7516 km coastline and Exclusive Economic Zone of India and will involve all the 13 coastal States and Union Territories along with other maritime stakeholders, including the fishing and coastal communities”.
The Navy stated in an announcement on Monday that the “scale and conceptual expanse of the exercise is unprecedented in terms of the geographical extent, the number of stakeholders involved, the number of units participating and in terms of the objectives to be met”.
The train, it stated, “is a build up towards the major Theatre-level exercise TROPEX (Theatre-level Readiness Operational Exercise)” performed by the Navy each two years.
“Sea Vigil and TROPEX together will cover the entire spectrum of maritime security challenges, including transition from peace to conflict,” the Navy stated, and added that “assets of the Indian Navy, Coast Guard, Customs and other maritime agencies will participate” in Sea Vigil, and its conduct is “also being facilitated by the Ministries of Defence, Home Affairs, Shipping, Petroleum and Natural Gas, Fisheries, Customs, State Governments and other agencies of Centre/ State”.
The Navy said that whereas “smaller scale exercises are conducted in coastal states regularly, including combined exercises amongst adjoining states, the conduct of a security exercise at national-level is aimed to serve a larger purpose” because it “provides opportunity, at the apex level, to assess our preparedness in the domain of maritime security and coastal defence”.
It stated Sea Vigil 21 “will provide a realistic assessment of our strengths and weaknesses and thus will help in further strengthening maritime and national security”.
The assertion stated “the entire coastal security set up was reorganised after the 26/11 Terror attack at Mumbai which was launched via the sea route”.

Apart from the Navy, the Indian Air Force, Coast Guard, National Security Guard, the Border Security Force, oil dealing with businesses and airports will take part within the train.
Captain Ajay Yadav, Command Coastal Security Officer on the Western Naval Command headquarters, stated the effectiveness of the fishing group in serving because the eyes and ears for early warning of threats may even be assessed throughout the train.