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Security and Sethu
"India's Oceanic Neighbours: Emerging Strategic Issues and Concerns" was the focus of a recent seminar organised by the University of Madras' Department of Defence and Strategic Studies and the Chennai Chapters of the Society for Indian Ocean Studies and the National Defence College Alumni Association. Presiding over the seminar was Vice Admiral (Retd.) Mihir Roy, who coined the phrase `ocean blindness' to describe the little attention Government paid to the Navy till the 1970s. For Admiral Roy, it was a homecoming of sorts. He spent a good part of his youth in the districts of the Madras Presidency where his father was a senior Forest Service Officer. His own alma mater is Presidency College and he never forgets to ask about the whereabouts of classmates.
Today, he spends much of his time getting different fora to focus on India's need to pay greater attention to its marine wealth and the necessity of protecting it.
As one speaker pointed out, India's Exclusive Economic Zone is likely to increase from a little over two million sq.km. to over three million sq.km. when the international delineation going on at present is completed in a couple of years. As it is, India has difficulty in patrolling this vast area; to protect an even bigger area will need greater strength. This, he pointed out, was an area where piracy was increasing, the booming container traffic was proving a boon to smugglers who were now doing business by the container-load, drug traffic and gun-running were proliferating, there were more oil-related disasters every year, and the growing business of mining the seas was bringing its own problems. To monitor and prevent this in an even larger EEZ than at present would call for considerable enhancement of the Navy.
Another little known fact pointed out was that it was not the Maldive Islands alone that would be submerged in a few decades. It could happen to much of the Andaman and Nicobars, swampy and riverine Bangladesh, and the Sunderbans in India. This could lead to large-scale migration of populations, in fact, evacuations of populations. Which in turn could lead to several security concerns.
In the local context, however, the subject that attracted most attention was the Sethusamudram Channel, NOT Canal, as some insisted. Nine schemes suggested between 1860 and 1922 and six schemes suggested post-Independence are all for the history books. What is now planned is a 167-km channel, 12 m deep and 300 m wide. The depth envisaged means that it will serve vessels only up to 25,000 dwt — and that means its focus will be on coastal and Indo-Sri Lanka traffic. Further, a 300 m channel width will not allow vessels to do U-turns, a 200 m-wide canal is more than enough for two vessels to pass each other. While the latter can bring down cost, the greater width of the former is unlikely to make the project viable.
While some saw development of ports such as Tuticorin, Nagappattinam, Colachel and Ramanathapuram and their hinterlands as positive consequences, others felt the rapid development of roads — particularly the North-South Highway, and the Golden Quadrilateral and its links — apart from the modernisation and expansion of the Railways could well lead to surface transport being preferred to sea transport. As for security concerns, it was felt it might enable better patrolling by smaller craft, but it would also favour movement of the Sea Tigers of Eelam and refugee influxes.
In fact, nearly 150 years after the Sethu Project was first suggested, no one still has a clear idea whether it is worth spending Rs. 3000 crore on it or not. Couldn't this be better spent on developing the Fisheries' Coast's hinterland and allowing surface transport to service it, many wondered. There may have been no answers to such questions and others about the Sethu Project, but that India needed to pay greater attention to its Navy was a message that came across loud and clear.
S. MUTHIAH
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