Mazagon Dock ‘Shipbuilder to the Nation’

Rear Admiral R.K. Shrawat (Retd),CMD, MDL

The Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL), aptly called “Ship Builder to the Nation”, is India’s leading Shipyard. The main activities are construction of state-of-the-art warships and submarines with facilities situated at Mumbai and Nhava.

The Chairman and Managing Director of the company, Rear Admiral R.K. Shrawat (Retd) said “The MDL has completed a massive modernization programme comprising a new wet basin, a modular workshop, a 300-tonne goliath crane and a cradle and assembly shop. This will help the MDL adopt the paradigm of Integrated Hull Construction. This revolutionary methodology will change the way ships are built in our country and drastically reduce build periods.”

Mazagon has the capability to build warships, submarines, merchant ships upto 30,000 DWT. For outfitting work, the company has a large number of workshops with sophisticated equipment and machines specific to hull fabrication and ship construction work.

Presently, MDL is building three, new-generation stealth warships for the Navy, named Project-17 frigates. The first ship in this class INS Shivalik was launched in April-2003 the second INS Satpura in June 2004 and the third and last INS Sahyadri was launched in May 2005. MDL is also building three ships of the follow-on to the Delhi Class of destroyers. The first ship of this Class ‘INS Kolkata’ was launched in March 2006. And the second ship ‘INS Kochi’ was launched using Pontoon Assisted Launching in September 2009.

Besides warships for the Navy, Mazagon Dock has also constructed a series of Offshore Patrol Vessels for the Coast Guard. Seven Coast Guard Ships, INS Vikram, INS Vijaya, INS Veera, INS Varuna, INS Vajra, INS Vivek and INS Vigraha, which today form the mainstay of the Coast Guard fleet, were built and delivered to the Indian Coast Guard between December 1983 and March 1990.

On the export front, Mazagon Dock has achieved another ‘first’. It is the only shipyard in India to have built a significant number of ships for foreign clients. Since 1974-75, the company has built and supplied, vessels to Singapore, the Iranian Navy, UK, the Gulf and Mozambique. Recently, “Commandant Mortenol” a 1,600 Cu M sand dredger was built for a French company operating from Guadeloupe, an Island territory of France in Eastern West Indies.

Presently, MDL is executing an export project of building two Multipurpose Support Vessels for M/s GGOSPL, Singapore. The first vessel “Greatship Laxmi” was launched in February 2010.

The Scorpene

The Scorpene Submarine has been jointly developed by DCN of France and Navantia Spain and incorporates the very latest Naval technology. At the heart of the submarine is the SUBTICS integrated combat system, a highly computerised central management system, which oversees all of the submarine’s sensors and its weapons. Each Scorpene will have a total complement of just 31. The contract, estimated to cost $3.5 billion, was signed at the Defence Ministry by representatives of the Indian and French governments. Designated as Project-75 Scorpene, it will see the latest in French conventional submarine building technology being turned into reality by the expert and experienced technocrats of MDL.