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Journalism of Courage
The Hindustan Shipyard Limited off Visakhapatnam may soon change hands and go to the Ministry of Defence. It is learnt that the Group of Ministers (GoM) recommended last month that the shipyard be transferred from the Ministry of Shipping to the Ministry of Defence. The ownership transfer is likely to assist the Navy in a big way with crucial parts of its under- wraps nuclear submarine project being manufactured at the shipyard.
“The Navy has long been trying to get the shipyard,” said a senior official of the Ministry of Shipping. In a reply to a question on the shipyard’s ownership status, Minister for Shipping T R Baalu said the GoM had submitted its recommendations and they were under consideration. Senior officials from the Hindustan Shipyard Limited (HSL) said they were yet to receive any communication on the ownership transfer. “There has been no communication on the transfer so far. The transfer to the Ministry of Defence will, however, be incidental. The shipyard has seen quite a turnaround from a Rs 120 crore turnover four years ago to the current Rs 400 crore,” said an HSL official.
The Navy has been HSL’s one of the major customers during the past two decades. The yard carries out minor repairs and refit jobs on frontline frigates of the Rajput class and Russian Foxtrot submarines in service with the Navy. While the Navy likes to keep its Advanced Technology Vessel nuclear submarine project under wraps, reports suggest that several crucial parts of the vessel are being manufactured at this shipyard.
The Ministry of Defence has three shipyards in the country — Mazagaon Dock Limited at Mumbai, Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited at Kolkata and Goa Shipyard Limited at Goa. The Ministry of Shipping currently has three shipyards — HSL at Visakhapatnam, Cochin Shipyard Limited at Kochi, Hooghly Dock and Port Engineers Limited at Kolkata. It will become poorer if HSL goes to the Ministry of Defence and has been resisting the move. HSL has built some 150 ships and repaired over 1,800 ships so far. Its mainstay lies in merchant ship building besides naval repairs.
The proposal for rehabilitation and transfer of HSL was sent to the GoM in March last year. The GoM had on board Defence Minister A K Antony, Minister for External Affairs Pranab Mukherjee, Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Minister for Shipping, Road Transport and Highways T R Baalu.
