NEW DELHI: The Union Budget 2015-16 has revitalised the Indian shipping and ports sector, paving the way for corporatisation of major port trusts and bringing tax relief for Indian sailors.

"It has been a very positive budget with a lot of policy initiatives for the infrastructure sector. Next part is implementation and we will get to it," said Rajive Kumar, secretary at the shipping ministry. The ministry has been, for the past couple of years, pushing for easing of norms for Indian seseafarers who are put at a disadvantage vis-a-vis their global counterparts

Prevalent norms made Indian sailors ineligible for tax refunds available for the non-resident Indians even after spending the mandatory 182 days in international voyage if a part of the journey was on the Indian coast. Finance minister Arun Jaitley, in his budget speech on Saturday, said the Central Board of Direct Taxes will have the enabling power to determine the "resident" status of an Indian seafarer whether working on a foreign or Indian ship. Anil Devli, chief operating officer at Indian Register of Shipping, said, "We still need to see what method CBDT will adopt to compute the resident status as there is no clarity on that front yet. But the budget has taken cognizance of the matter and hopefully we will see migration of seafarers to Indian flags."

India supplied 60,000 fresh seamen and 44,500 officers in 2014, according to the Manpower Update 2010-2014 of BIMCO/ISF. However, according to the directorate general of shipping, nearly three-fourths of Indian seafarers are employed with foreign shipping companies. The shortage of crew, in fact, has impacted the upkeep and maintenance of Indian shipping companies' vessels, which are often "laid up" for these reasons. The Finance Bill states that, "In case of foreign-bound ships, where the destination of the voyage is outside India, there is uncertainty with regard to the manner and basis of determination of the period of stay in India for crew members who are Indian citizens."

The amendment gives powers to CBDT to prescribe the manner and procedure for computing period of stay in India. This would be effective retrospectively from April 1, 2015, so the benefit can be drawn from the next financial year onwards.