The curious case of Mumbai’s missing speedboat engines
MUMBAI: One cool January morning in 2020, a high-ranking Mumbai police officer, part of the force’s motor transport department, took a test ride on one of the patrolling boats from Bhaucha Dhakka, a wharf on the eastern sea front of the city, and found that a boat that was supposed to hit a speed of 45 nautical miles per hour (about 83 kmph), was barely able to reach 10 nautical miles per hour.
Intrigued, he checked on the performance of the other 24 speedboats in the police fleet. Only three worked to specification.
The boats themselves were special because most of them were acquired after the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai to protect the state’s 652km-long coastline. Of the 24 in Mumbai, for instance, 20 were acquired after 2008, part of the 57 speed boats bought by the Maharashtra government to strengthen coastal security.
The discovery by the officer – who asked not to be identified – is now a fraud case before the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) that involves replacing the engines of these boats with older, and less powerful ones.
EOW Mumbai is taking over a case that the Mumbai police’s Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) has been investigating since 2021, and which led Sunil Ramanand, additional director general (Information Technology and Transport) Maharashtra Police, to file an FIR at the Chatushringi police station in Pune in April. It named three companies, which had the maintenance contract for the upkeep of these boats. They are accused of perpetuating a fraud in connivance with government officials, that included removing the powerful engines of the speedboats and replacing them with faulty engines. “In 2020-21, it was learnt that a few engines of the patrolling boats were replaced. ACB conducted an inquiry and submitted a report to the government,” said Ramanand. “Accordingly, I have got a case registered in Pune. As the matter falls within the jurisdiction of Mumbai police, the case was transferred to Sewri police station,” he said.
The FIR (HT has seen a copy) names Ratnakar Dandekar, the managing director of Aquarius Shipyard Pvt Ltd (ASPL), some personnel of Goa Shipyard Pvt Ltd, and of Brilliant Seagull Pvt Ltd (BSPL), as well as some government officials, under sections 177 (knowingly furnishing false information to a public servant), 197 (issuing or signing false certificate), 406 (punishment for criminal breach of trust) and 420 (cheating) of the IPC. No arrests
have been made in the case yet.
The boats
On January 5, 2009, two months after 10 seaborne terrorists left Karachi for Mumbai and launched a deadly attack on multiple sites, including the Taj Hotel, the Chabad House, and Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus station, among others, the state sanctioned funds to hire more patrolling boats. In 2009-10, the central government procured 28 interceptor speed boats manufactured by Goa Shipyard Pvt Ltd. In 2011-12, the state procured 29 boats built by Marine Frontiers Pvt Ltd, and gave the contract for their maintenance to Goa Shipyard. ASPL and BSPL were given the subcontracts to maintain these boats.
The state notified three police stations as responsible for coastal policing in shallow waters within the territorial limits – their jurisdiction ranged from the sea shore to 12 nautical miles off the coast. Surveillance on the high seas remained within the purview of the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard.
Before 26/11, the Mumbai coastal police had four patrol speed boats, and would also hire fishing trawlers. After the Lashkar-e-taiba (Let)-led terror attacks, a committee led by retired bureaucrat Ram Pradhan suggested upgradation of the coastal security, and pointed to several loopholes in the security strategy that needed to be plugged immediately.
The new boats had aluminvinay ium hulls and bulletproof cabins. They could attain a maximum speed of 45 knots per hour and were designed to chase any intruding vessel all the way till international waters – the exclusive economic zone is till 200 nautical miles – in case of an emergency. Of the new speedboats, 20 were assigned to the Mumbai police to secure the city’s 114km coastline, taking the number in its fleet to 24. Six went to the Navi Mumbai police, five to Palghar, and eight to Raigad coastal police. Eight speedboats were provided to Ratnagiri police and seven to Sindhudurg. The Thane coastal police already had a patrolling boat procured before the 26/11 attack, and wasn’t given a new boat. Three boats were provided to the Thane rural police.
Of the three boats whose performance the police offer who unearthed the fraud found satisfactory, two were part of the Mumbai police fleet before 26/11.
The fraud
“Five of the 24 vessels were lying for repairs at Lakda Bunder yard of the Mumbai police located at Reay Road,” said the officer. “When I paid a surprise visit to the yard in January 2020, I saw three people employed by the maintenance contractor removing an engine of one of the vessels purportedly to take it elsewhere for servicing. I also discovered that no record was maintained to track engines and their servicing.”
In July 2020, based on the police officer’s findings, the then joint commissioner of police Chaube (law and order) asked the then additional commissioner of police Atul Patil (Motor Transport department) to conduct an internal inquiry, which was eventually done by assistant commissioner of police Nimba Patil. But Patil’s investigation was officially closed in November 2020.
The reason? In August 2020, Ocean Blue Boating Pvt Ltd – the company which took over the maintenance contract for 29 patrolling boats the previous December – apprised the home department that the original, powerful engines fitted on some of the boats had been replaced by old and outdated ones.it wasn’t clear how that had happened. Ocean Blue refused to comment on the development.
In October 2020, the then home minister Anil Deshmukh referred the matter to the State Intelligence Department (SID), and in January 2021, the government directed ACB to probe the matter. As per the FIR, ACB investigated the fraud in three months and submitted its report to the state government on March 30, 2021. The state forwarded the investigation report to the Maharashtra DGP in October, and five months later, in April, the FIR was registered.
“With the help of two senior officers, we completed the inquiry and submitted our report to the government,” additional director general of police, ACB, Prabhat Kumar said. He refused to divulge further details about the report.
After perusing the report, ADG (IT and Transport) Ramanand recommended that the state government register a criminal case and also file a civil suit to recover losses caused by the fraud. The FIR alleged that the accused had caused losses of ₹7.23 crore by committing a fraud on the state government.
What was left unsaid was the vulnerability the fraud caused in the city’s coastal defence.
The FIR
According to the FIR, engines were replaced in several boats between 2016 and 2019.
“ASPL, one of the sub-contractors of Goa Shipyard, which held the contract before Ocean Blue) obtained the work order for engine maintenance and overhauling of the boats. Some of the companies did not even qualify to maintain the speed boats,” it said. “The companies, in the name of engine repair and maintenance, took the boats to their workshops and instead of buying the equipment from Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMS), imported old engines and accessories and later installed the same in the boats. They however also charged the state government for new engines and accessories,” it added.
The FIR added that ASPL officials changed engines of four boats while BSPL changed engines of eight boats. ASPL removed three engines of Navi Mumbai’s boat, Sagardhish, in November 2016. They replaced them with old engines from a United Arab Emirates (Uae)-based company in February 2017, the inquiry found. The engine of Sagardhish was installed in the Mumbai Police patrolling boats, Tarang and Mumbai-3, the FIR adds.
ASPL and BSPL did not respond to repeated calls and messages for comments on the case.
Similarly, engines of boats owned by Palghar police and Kelwa police were replaced in 2018; even those were replaced by engines originally registered to a Uae-based company. From May 2018 to January 2019, engines of eight more boats were replaced with old engines.
An officer, who was part of the ACB investigation, said that while the original engines were registered in the name of the State Intelligence Department, most of the old engines fitted on the patrolling boats were registered to companies based in Dubai or Abu Dhabi.
At present, the Mumbai fleet is down to 50% of its original capacity – only 12 of the 24 patrolling boats are in working condition. Nine boats are used to patrol 10km each, from BARC to Gorai, while three are kept on standby. Since the start of the investigation, however, the coastal police has evolved a Standard Operating Procedure for repair and maintenance of the boats. It now undertakes work at its own servicing yard at Lakda Bunder and documents every step.