With the ever increasing incidents of piracy and armed robbery at sea in recent years, the need for joint operations is felt all over the world to combat these problems. In this respect, joint exercise between Indian and Japanese Coast Guards was conducted off Chennai in November last year. The aim of the exercise was to promote co-operation between Indian and Japanese Coast Guards with a view to enhancing mutual capabilities for search and rescue operations, combating piracy and armed robbery, damage control and casualty evacuation at sea for safer seas.

The joint exercise was christened Kyoju which means 'search' in Japanese language. Japanese Coast Guard ship Yashima, Japanese helicopter BEL 212, Indian Coast Guard ship Sarang, MR aircraft Dornier and SAR helicopter Chetak participated in the exercise. One SCI tanker, Havildar Abdul Hamid, was also involved in the exercise.

During the exercise, the SCI tanker which was acting as a pirated ship raised a distress alarm for fire onboard. The alarm was picked up by satellite and JCG ship Yashima. The same was relayed to Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, Chennai and Rescue Coordination Centre, Tokyo by INMCC, Bangalore. Later, CGS Sarang, JCGS Yashima, Dornier and helicopters were put on task for search of the vessel in distress. The vessel was located and the fire was put out by the Coast Guard ships. The vessel was later boarded by joint operation team comprising Indian and Japanese commandos and the pirates were detained.

Other highlights of the exercise were cross-landings, casualty evacuation and real time analysis of GMDSS system components. This exercise was witnessed by Inspector General P Paleri, Deputy Director General, Coast Guard.

Indo-Maldives joint exercise, termed as Dosti, aimed for strengthening the friendship and cooperation with Maldives. It was a proud moment for the ship, based at Haldia, to be nominated for this type of exercise and to represent Indian Coast Guard in the joint exercises at Male for Dosti-VI. The preparation for Dosti-VI started with a lot of vigour. The ship's company was highly motivated as the ship was going for its maiden cruise.

The joint exercises were planned for five days. During these five days various presentations on subjects like search and rescue, ship's husbandry and CG customs and traditions were presented at MNSS (CG) Conference Hall. Day one started with the welcome address by Col Ahmed Zaheer, DG, MNSS (CG). A simulated SAR exercise was also carried out off Male in which apart from the units of Indian Coast Guard, two MNSS (CG) units participated. In this exercise, a distress message was passed to the joint operation team at MNSS (CG) by CGS Sucheta Kriplani simulating MV Universal Explorer. After the termination of the simulated exercise, the MNSS(CG) units returned to the harbour and the ICG units were put on night patrol. Day three started with entering of ICG units into harbour. Thereafter, a debriefing was carried out followed by a presentation on CG customs and traditions. The weather was bad and sea was rough but the degree of professionalism shown by the participating unit was highly commendable.