Posted on October 20, 2025
This comes amid the inauguration of the ‘DCI Dredge Godavari’, a 12,000 cubic metre dredger, on Saturday
The Dredging Corporation of India (DCI) recently announced plans to invest approximately Rs 2,000 crores to buy two more Trailer Suction Hopper Dredgers (TSHDs) from Kerala-based Cochin Shipyard Limited (CSL).
This comes amid the inauguration of the ‘DCI Dredge Godavari’ on Saturday. The 12,000 cubic metre dredger, developed jointly with Dutch company Royal IHC, is said to be India’s largest TSHD.
Capable of dredging up to 36m deep, DCI Dredge Godavari is expected to significantly enhance India’s port deepening and land reclamation capacity, thus enhancing the country’s dredging ecosystem.
The dredging company plans to scale up its operations from the current 60 million cubic metres (with ten TSHDs) to more than 100 million cubic metres, using its latest TSHD. This would let it use its own fleet of TSHDs, without having to depend on chartering foreign-flagged dredgers.
“We will reach out to CSL for two more dredgers in the days to come because we intend to be a global leader. We are doing maintenance dredging now, and we intend to do capital dredging in the days to come,” DCI Chairman M. Angamuthu told The Hindu, ahead of the DCI Dredge Godavari launch.
He added that the DCI was also in talks with various port authorities—the Visakhapatnam Port Authority, Paradip Port Authority, Deendayal Port Authority, and the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority—to finalise a Rs 500 crore rights issue with the reputed shipbuilder.
Cochin Shipyard also launched two other vessels on Saturday: an Anti-Submarine Warfare Shallow Water Craft (ASW SWC) commissioned as the INS Magdala, and a Hybrid Electric Methanol-Ready Commissioning Service Operation Vessel (CSOV), designed to harness wind energy offshore.
