India's Exclusive Economic Zone of 2.37 million sq km presents both opportunities and challenges. How is India operationalising its maritime domain awareness?

Q. India's Exclusive Economic Zone of 2.37 million sq km presents both opportunities and challenges. How is India operationalising its maritime domain awareness? (15 marks, 250-350 words)

Under UNCLOS, India's EEZ of about 2.37 million sq km — nearly two-thirds of its land area — is simultaneously a resource frontier and a security frontier. Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA), the effective knowledge of all activity in this space, is the bridge between the two.

Opportunities the EEZ offers - Blue economy: fisheries, offshore hydrocarbons, seabed minerals and renewable ocean energy. - Trade artery: the overwhelming bulk of India's external trade by volume moves by sea, making EEZ stability an economic necessity. - Strategic depth: control of approaches to the Indian Ocean Region and protection of Offshore Development Areas and island territories.

Challenges in securing it - Scale versus assets: a ~7,500 km coastline and over 1,300 islands stretch surveillance thin. - Non-traditional threats: illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing; narcotics, arms and human trafficking; and post-26/11 concerns over sea-borne infiltration. - Competitive presence: expanding extra-regional naval and research-vessel activity in the IOR. - Ecological stress: oil spills, marine pollution and cyclone-related distress at sea.

How India is operationalising MDA - Platform induction: ICGS Akshay, commissioned at Goa Shipyard on 27 June 2026, is the fourth of eight new-generation Fast Patrol Vessels tasked with law enforcement, search and rescue and marine environmental protection [1]. The eight-vessel, ₹473 crore contract is a Buy (Indian-IDDM) project; at 52 m and 320 tonnes these ships can operate in shallow waters to guard offshore assets and islands [2]. - Indigenisation as capability: over 60% indigenous content and in-house design deepen the domestic vendor base under Atmanirbhar Bharat [3]. - Sustained delivery tempo: class leader ICGS Adamya entered service in June 2025, with successive commissionings since [4]. - Networked awareness: coastal radar chains, AIS tracking and information-fusion arrangements convert individual hulls into a common operating picture.

Thus India is converting hulls, sensors and shipyard capacity into a single surveillance grid. Sustaining this — by pairing continued indigenous inductions with tighter inter-agency data-sharing — will let the EEZ mature from a zone to be defended into a blue-economy engine, advancing SDG-14 and the vision of a secure maritime neighbourhood.

(~330 words)

Sources: 1. ICGS Akshay Commissioned into Bharatiya Tatrakshak Fleet — PIB, 27 June 2026 — commissioning date, venue and operational roles 2. MoD signs Rs 473 crore contract with GSL for eight Fast Patrol Vessels — PIB — contract value, Buy (Indian-IDDM) category, dimensions, shallow-water and offshore-asset role 3. Two Fast Patrol Vessels constructed by GSL launched in Goa — PIB, Jan 2025 — over 60% indigenous content and in-house GSL design 4. ICG inducts 'Adamya', first FPV of eight built by GSL — PIB — induction of the class leader in June 2025