**3. Indian Ocean region**

*The Indian ocean region had become the strategic heartland of the 21st century, dislodging Europe and North East Asia which adorned this position in the 20th century … the developments in the Indian Ocean region were contributing to the advent of a less Western centric and a more multi-polar world. [17]*

*—Donald L. Berlin, Head of Security Studies, Asia Pacific Centre for Security Studies, Honolulu, Hawaii*

The twenty-first century is seeing massive strategic build up in the IOR, not just from the nations within the region but also from extra-regional powers to safeguard their strategic interests. These strategic interests range from political to economic and also militarily as a theater for great power rivalry being played out in the region. The IOR is the locus of important international SLOC for varied reasons and thus has a very unique strategic relevance [17].

Militarily, SLOC is a major maritime instrument of power, and the maritime geography dictates deployment of maritime forces. The security vulnerabilities in the IOR coupled with the strategic relevance of the SLOC ensures high deployment of maritime forces not just from the nations in the region but also by the extra-regional powers. The political interests originate from the fact that the SLOC signifies the state of relation with the nations along the sea route traversed. The choke points that govern the entry of SLOC into the region have a significant role in shaping the geopolitics of the region. Economically, the shortest route is the most important aspect for SLOC, and any disruption may call for strategic action. The socioeconomic status of nations in the region facilitates large-scale interference by the extra-regional powers, and thus rule-based regional framework is a big causality. The piracy and maritime terrorism in the region being on the rise has ensured huge presence of maritime forces to escort the SLOC, making it a high density

shipping traffic zone. Anti-piracy measures also dictate rerouting of the SLOC, at times against the shortest route logic [17, 10].

The unique geography of India in the IOR and its position with respect to the international shipping lanes carrying bulk of the SLOC have not translated to having even a single transshipment hub in India. This is a major cause of suboptimal routing of shipping in the Indian subcontinent. The bulk of the seaborne trade to or from India, to or from America, East Asia, Africa, Europe and more passes through the Indian territorial waters. The ships carrying this cargo break their bulk in Colombo or in Singapore/Hong Kong. Further, the poor maritime infrastructure in terms of ports and shipyards has a significant impact on the shipping traffic in the region. The poor management of the shipping traffic is a serious cause of concern, in terms of distribution of the traffic that has a major impact on the crowding of the shipping lanes [18].

The shipbuilding industry in the Indian subcontinent has been a nonstarter for various reasons, in spite of having all the inputs necessary for a flourishing industry. Lack of strategic vision probably is the major cause of such a non-starter. Although India boasts of a glorious maritime past, but in the modern era, India has been termed as Sea Blind and has not displayed substantial maritime intent since Independence. The maritime infrastructure has been working in progress, and a huge potential is waiting to be explored and exploited. Right from specialized human resource to conducive policy framework has been a major cause of concern, and thus the contribution of the maritime sector to the GDP is in single digits. The sector not doing well also manifests as minimal investments on R&D and strategic thinking [19].

The Indian shipbuilding industry currently accounts for only 1% of the global shipbuilding market. There are 27 shipyards in the country presently, and out of these, 19 are in the private sector. The current cumulative shipbuilding capacity of Indian shipyards is around 0.5 million deadweight tonnage. The order books of the public sector undertakings (PSUs) are completely skewed owing to high government protection enjoyed by them, whereas the private sector has been struggling due to lack of level playing field. Our shipyards are not competitive in the global market due to high cost and time overrun and archaic infrastructure and technology used. Some of the highly specialized components like the propellers and engines are still being imported at very high cost. Although we are in the major shipping routes, internationally, our shipbuilding and also ship repair industry has not been able to attract much business due to cost and quality concerns. There is serious gap in brand building and marketing as part of the national policy. As a nation, we were late in recognizing our maritime potential, and thus there is total absence of strategic vision [20].

The twenty-first century is certainly seeing a sea change in the maritime outlook for the IOR, both domestically and globally. The Indo-Pacific strategic construct is a recognition of the importance of the IOR in the global strategic space. More and more nations are deploying strategic assets in the region both militarily as well as for economic and political interests. India is being seen as a strategic partner for the global powers, specifically for the Indo part of the Indo-Pacific strategic construct. Domestically, as well, there is substantial strategic intent being displayed by successive governments. The Security And Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) vision, announced by the Indian prime minister in May 2015, and the earlier mega initiative, named Sagarmala, are some of the critical policy announcements and affirmative action being aggressively pursued by the Indian establishment. Massive maritime capability and capacity building initiative are being given high priority including transshipment hubs, seamless multi-model connectivity and inland water transport across the river systems [21].

#### *Acoustic Habitat Degradation Due to Shipping in the Indian Ocean Region DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.90108*

The tropical littoral waters in the IOR ensure significant challenges in the acoustic monitoring of the underwater domain. The sonars deployed for any attempt at underwater survey for effective underwater domain awareness (UDA) is grossly limited due to the sub-optimal performance. The tropical waters manifest as higher depth for the sound axis synonymous with the SOFAR channel that dictates the interaction of the acoustic propagation with the surface and the bottom. The depth of the sound axis at the equator is close to 2000 m, in contrast to 50 m at the poles. Acoustically, the littoral waters are defined based on interactions with the surface and bottom boundaries; thus in the tropical waters even in water depths of 3000 m, the underwater domain behaves like shallow waters. This means that the entire IOR is likely to be behaving like littoral waters acoustically due to tropical conditions. To top it all the tropical conditions also ensure higher surface and bottom fluctuations, and thus, the multipath propagation further translates to higher acoustic signal distortions. Thus, any attempt at acoustic habitat assessment to ascertain acoustic habitat degradation will subject to the tropical littoral limitations in the IOR [22].

The regional dynamics in the IOR has a profound impact on the geopolitical outcomes. The lack of synergy among the nations in the region and large-scale interference by the extra-regional powers have facilitated total absence of rulebased governance. The regulatory framework to manage acoustic habitat degradation and R&D efforts to facilitate realistic acoustic habitat assessment have been a non-starter. The socioeconomic status of the nations in the region makes it politically unviable to bring regulatory frameworks to manage the marine environment effectively [23].
