Kerala High Court rules Fort Kochi Police can probe ship accidents within 200 nautical miles of the coast.
Kochi: The Kerala High Court has ruled that the Fort Kochi Coastal Police can investigate ship accidents occurring within 200 nautical miles off the Kerala coast.
Justice G. Girish made the observation while dismissing a plea to quash a case registered by the Fort Kochi Coastal Police. The case relates to the vessel named Orange Victoria colliding with a fishing boat about 45 nautical miles off the Kerala coast.
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Synergy Maritime Pvt Ltd, the owner of the foreign vessel Orange Victoria, had approached the High Court seeking to quash the case.
With the court dismissing the plea, a long-standing legal hurdle to the investigation has been cleared. The collision took place in March 2021. Although no one was killed, the fishing boat named Sithara, belonging to a Thiruvananthapuram native, was damaged in the incident.
The petitioners argued that under international law, state police authorities do not have the jurisdiction to investigate accidents occurring beyond 35 nautical miles from the coast. They also cited a Supreme Court judgment in the Italian marines case in support of their argument.
However, the High Court observed that the accident occurred within India's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), which extends up to 200 nautical miles from the coast. The Centre had issued a notification in 1981 extending the applicability of Indian criminal law and criminal procedure provisions to this zone. The court also noted that a separate notification issued in 2016 authorised the Fort Kochi Coastal Police Station to investigate such cases.
According to the court, the 2016 notification was not in force when the Italian marines case was decided. Therefore, the earlier Supreme Court ruling does not prevent the Coastal Police from investigating the present case.
The government also submitted that restrictions under international law would continue to apply to incidents occurring beyond India's 200-nautical-mile EEZ.
Director General of Prosecution T. Asaf Ali appeared for the state government.
Published: 23 Jul 2026, 02:38 pm IST
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