NO: MSL-24(1)/2008   
 

        Dated: 12.01.2011
 

WHEREAS shipping industry has recently gone through one of the worst recessionary phase and has begun to slowly recover, and Indian industry has been no exception to this, 

AND WHEREAS procedural regime in many a countries have imposed crewing requirements on ships doing business in their coastal waters, necessitating grant of certain dispensations to the Indian Ship owners in order to prevent either loss of Indian business or of Indian Tonnage in terms of the need to flag the ship out of India, 

AND WHEREAS it is only appropriate that similar crewing requirements are also imposed on ships engaged in shipping and related activities in Indian Coastal Waters, 

Now therefore, the Director General of Shipping in pursuance of the power conferred on him in respect of the provisions of Section 406 and 407 of the   M S Act, 1958 read together with MoS S.O. No 3144 dated 17^th December 1960 issues the following conditions for granting license to foreign flag ships under either of the sections i.e. 406 or 407 of the M S Act laying down the norms for engaging Indian crew on board of these ships; 

1.   Where the period of license exceeds 90 days but is less than 181 days, a minimum of one third of officers and ratings, engaged on board as per the safe manning norm or actual deployment whichever is higher and be holding relevant Indian Certificate. 

2.   Where the period of license exceeds 180 days; a minimum of one half of officers and ratings, engaged on board as per the safe manning norm or actual deployment whichever is higher and be holding relevant Indian Certificate. 

3.   The safe manning norm mentioned above will be the one applicable to the concerned ship. 

4.   For determining the number of Indian of Indian officers and crew to be engaged the officers and the ratings will be taken as two separate categories.  Any fraction will be rounded to nearest integer. 

5.   Where the period of license is not continuous, above condition will be imposed whenever the cumulative period of license for that ship exceeds i.e. 90 or 180 days in a calendar year and the condition of engagement of Indian crew will be imposed from the day when 90 or 180 days are exceeded. 

6.   DG reserves the right to relax or vary, alter or rescind any of the provision above in the interest of retaining Indian tonnage, boosting Indian trade or in public interest for reasons recorded in writing. 
These guidelines will come into effect from the date of issue of this order.

Sd/-
(Dr. S. B. Agnihotri)
Director General of Shipping &
ex. officio Additional Secretary to the Govt. of India

F&A-12

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