Reforming India’s Maritime Legal Framework: A Critical Analysis Of The Merchant Shipping Act, 2025 And Emerging Challenges In Maritime Governance
- IJLLR Journal
- 3 days ago
- 2 min read
Rudra Jaiswal, B.A. LL.B., Amity University Madhya Pradesh, Gwalior, India
Sanskriti Sinha, B.A. LL.B., Amity University Madhya Pradesh, Gwalior, India
ABSTRACT
India’s dependence on the sea has never been in doubt; the currency of its shipping law has been. For sixty-seven years the sector was governed by the Merchant Shipping Act, 1958, a statute descended from Victorian British legislation and swollen by amendment into a text of over 560 sections. The Merchant Shipping Act, 2025, assented to on 18 August 2025 and brought into force on 15 March 2026, replaces it along with the Coasting Vessels Act, 1838, as part of a package that also includes the Carriage of Goods by Sea Act, 2025, the Bills of Lading Act, 2025 and the Coastal Shipping Act, 2025. This paper argues that the reform is genuine but incomplete. The consolidation into sixteen Parts and 325 sections, the liberalisation of vessel ownership, the extension of registration to small and non-mechanised craft, the alignment of seafarer welfare with the Maritime Labour Convention, the incorporation of hot pursuit and stateless-vessel powers, and the creation of a framework for maritime emergencies are real improvements. Against these, the paper identifies four difficulties: the extent to which substance has been left to delegated legislation still incomplete at commencement; the failure to modernise the compensation architecture for catastrophic casualties, exposed by the sinking of the MSC ELSA 3 off Kerala in May 2025; the reduction of fishers’ protection to an enabling power rather than an applied standard; and the exclusion of coastal States from emergency response machinery. The framework is then assessed against emerging challenges: the adjournment of the IMO Net-Zero Framework, the MASS Code for autonomous ships, cyber risk, the shadow tanker fleet and ship recycling. Eight recommendations follow.
Keywords: Merchant Shipping Act 2025; maritime law; India; ship registration; seafarers’ welfare; marine pollution; IMO; delegated legislation; admiralty jurisdiction; maritime governance.
