The Hindu Business Line : Decision soon on takeover of Hind Shipyard by Defence Ministry

Kolkata, Aug. 25 The Defence Ministry’s proposal to take over Hindustan Shipyard Ltd (HSL), now under the Shipping Ministry, is before the Cabinet and a decision on this will be taken soon.

The transfer will help the Visakhapatnam-based shipyard build vessels for the defence purposes. This was indicated by Mr Mangapati Pallam Raju, Minister of State for Defence, here on Tuesday.

“There are so many issues, which have to be addressed before going ahead with the transfer and particularly critical is the issue of compensation, which has to be sorted out before we can go ahead,” Mr Raju said, while talking to newspersons during his visit to Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers here.

The Shipping Ministry had earlier commissioned Axis Bank for the valuation of HSL and, based on the report, set the valuation at Rs 1,000-1,500 crore for the transfer to take place.

Once acquired, HSL would be altered and modernised to meet the requirements of Indian Navy, he said pointing out that there were currently three defence shipyards in the country, one each in Mumbai, Goa and Kolkata, and the decision to acquire the one in Visakhapatnam had been taken to speed up defence modernisation.

The Ministry of Defence, he said, has earmarked Rs 573 crore for the modernisation of the defence shipyards over the next few years. “Modernisation is a continuous process and along with it the augmentation of facilities is also being looked into,” he added.

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