NEW DELHI: Navy chief Admiral Krishna Swaminathan will begin a two-country visit to Australia and New Zealand on Wednesday for high-level military talks, as India works to build a wider web of operational maritime partnerships across the Indo-Pacific with countries that sit astride its eastern sea lanes.
In Australia, Adm Swaminathan will meet Chief of Navy Vice Adm Matthew Buckley and Chief of the Defence Force Adm Mark Hammond, besides holding talks with Vice Adm Justin Jones, the Commander Joint Operations, the Navy said on Tuesday.
The discussions will cover operational interaction, interoperability, information-sharing, training and professional exchanges, according to the statement. Adm Swaminathan will also visit operational and training establishments for talks on maritime capabilities, emerging technologies and professional military education.
The visit comes two months after PM Narendra Modi travelled to Australia for the third India-Australia annual summit, where the two sides described defence and security cooperation as a "cornerstone" of their Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. They also adopted a Maritime Security Collaboration Roadmap to step up information-sharing, capability development and operational coordination.
The naval relationship with Canberra has acquired a substantial operational dimension in recent years. The Mutual Logistics Support Arrangement inked in 2020 allows Indian and Australian warships and aircraft to use each other's facilities for logistics support, while the two navies exercise together regularly through AUSINDEX. Australia has also been part of the Malabar exercise with India, the US and Japan since 2020. The wider engagement spans all three services, including Indian participation in Australia's Pitch Black air exercise and the bilateral AUSTRAHIND army drills.
Adm Swaminathan will then travel to New Zealand, where he is slated to meet Rear Adm Garin Golding, Chief of Navy of the Royal New Zealand Navy, and engage with the senior defence leadership.
The Wellington leg follows the elevation of India-New Zealand ties to a Strategic Partnership during Modi's July visit, along with a Roadmap to 2030 that looks at regular military exercises, service-level visits, personnel exchanges and high-level defence dialogues.
Importantly, the two countries had concluded a Maritime Cooperation Arrangement, an arrangement on hydrography and nautical cartography and a maritime-domain Mutual Logistics Support Arrangement. The framework provides for bilateral naval activities, including exercises, as well as information exchange and practical cooperation at sea.
Such interoperability and information-sharing have gained in importance as the People's Liberation Army Navy extends its reach well beyond China's near seas. The PLA Navy now has around 370 warships and submarines, a figure projected to touch about 435 by 2030.
Chinese deployments in the Indian Ocean have become a persistent feature, with warships, submarines and survey vessels operating across the region. Beijing's military base at Djibouti and its access to ports in the wider Indian Ocean give the PLA Navy expanding options for sustained deployments.
India has responded by scaling up mission-based deployments, maritime-domain awareness and information exchange with partner countries. The Information Fusion Centre-Indian Ocean Region at Gurugram, which hosts liaison officers from several partner navies, has emerged as an important node in that network.
The Navy said the visit would "further strengthen" cooperation with the Royal Australian Navy and the Royal New Zealand Navy through "practical and sustained maritime engagement", contributing to peace, security and stability in the Indo-Pacific.