A Dossier on Visakhapatnam
National Shipping Board in favour of getting Seafarer tax waived. Planning to provide armed guards on Indian ships to counter pirates.
Visakhapatnam Port Trust, June 22, 2011
The Chairman of National Shipping Board (NSB) Captain P V K Mohan spoke with the press soon after the 116th meeting. He said that NSB will be asking the Union Finance Ministry for the waiver of the seafarer tax. The board is also planning to provide armed guards to Indian ships so as to counter sea pirates.
Capt. Mohan highlighted the need to address the problem of removal of wreckage of ships and boats around the port. He cited the example of how M V River Prince has eroded most of the beach of Goa in the last 10 years. He said that the failure of removal of the wreckage has damaged the beautiful beach and that we need to pay a heavy price for the indirect damages caused by it. India accounts to 7% manpower of international shipping and that two in every 3 of them are working on foreign ships. He said that Indian ships have a good tonnage and that NSB is planning to reach between 15 million to 17 million tonnes by 2020.
Visakhapatnam Port Trust (VPT) Chairman Ajeya Kallam, Deputy Director-General of Shipping H Katri and Mr. Deapak Sheety spoke at the conference.
The NSB is a permanent statutory body established in the year 1959 under Section 4 of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1958 to advise the Government of India on matters related to shipping and its development.
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