The 2nd edition of the bilateral maritime exercise SAHYOG HOP-TAC, conducted between the Indian Coast Guard and the Vietnam Coast Guard, concluded off the coast of Chennai on 27 August 2026. The Indian side deployed 8 ships and 6 aircraft, while Vietnam was represented by patrol vessel CSB 8002 and a 6-member delegation. The high-intensity sea phase came immediately after the 7th India-Vietnam Coast Guard High-Level Meeting on 25 August, reinforcing a partnership that has steadily grown since the two forces first signed a cooperation framework in 2015.
What Happened in the 2nd Edition of SAHYOG HOP-TAC
Vietnam Coast Guard ship CSB 8002, escorted by a 6-member delegation, arrived at Chennai port on 24 August 2026 to mark the start of the engagement. The delegation was led by Colonel Dr. Nguyen Minh Khanh, Deputy Commander and Chief of Staff of Coast Guard Region 2 of the Vietnam Coast Guard, and was received at the Western Port (Chennai) by Commander Yoginder Dhaka of Coast Guard Region (East). The arrival preceded the 7th India-Vietnam Coast Guard High-Level Meeting, held in Chennai on 25 August 2026, which set the stage for the sea-phase drill on 27 August.
The High-Level Meeting was co-chaired by Director General of the Indian Coast Guard, Paramesh Sivamani, and Vice Commandant of the Vietnam Coast Guard, Major General Luong Dinh Hung. Both sides reviewed ongoing cooperation under the 2015 Memorandum of Understanding on Coast Guard Cooperation and reaffirmed their commitment to strengthening coordination in maritime search and rescue, maritime law enforcement, marine pollution response and capacity building.
The sea phase that followed on 27 August saw 8 Indian Coast Guard ships and 6 aircraft operating alongside CSB 8002 off the Chennai coast. The exercise was jointly overseen by the Director General of the Indian Coast Guard and the Vice Commandant of the Vietnam Coast Guard. Indian Coast Guard personnel and their Vietnamese counterparts engaged in a series of coordinated drills designed to test interoperability, standardise emergency procedures, and sharpen joint response capabilities for real-world maritime incidents.
Inside the Chennai Drill: Assets and Operational Focus
The scale of the 2nd edition was significantly larger than the maiden 2018 drill. The Indian Coast Guard fielded a balanced sea-and-air force of 8 surface platforms and 6 aircraft, while Vietnam contributed its 8000-series patrol vessel CSB 8002 and an accompanying delegation. Together, the assets allowed both coast guards to rehearse coordinated movement at sea, communication handovers between units, and integrated air-sea surveillance.
The exercise focused on four core operational areas:
- Maritime Search and Rescue (SAR): Rehearsals for locating vessels in distress, recovering survivors, and providing medical and material assistance in coordinated sea-air operations.
- Standardisation of Emergency Response Procedures: Aligning the way both forces raise alarms, classify incidents, and activate response protocols so that assets from either country can plug into a single operating picture without delay.
- Tactical Coordination and Interoperability: Practising formation steaming, ship-handling signals, joint boarding operations and cross-platform communication to ensure that ICG and VCG crews can operate as a single task group when required.
- Marine Pollution Response and Maritime Law Enforcement: Procedures for containing oil spills and other hazardous discharges at sea, as well as coordinated action against illegal fishing, smuggling, piracy and trafficking, which are common threats across the Indo-Pacific.
By the close of the sea phase, both services reported that the drill had given personnel direct exposure to each other’s working methods, operational vocabulary and command structures. Such exposure is difficult to replicate through classroom training alone and is precisely what gives bilateral exercises their long-term value: when the two coast guards next meet at sea, whether during a typhoon response or a joint patrol, the procedures rehearsed off Chennai can be activated almost on instinct.
The Road to SAHYOG HOP-TAC: A Brief History
The first edition of SAHYOG HOP-TAC was held in October 2018, also in the Bay of Bengal off the Chennai coast. Vietnam was represented by Coast Guard ship CSB 8001, which sailed 3,575 nautical miles from Hanoi to Chennai, led by Commandant Major General Nguyen Van Son. India participated with three Coast Guard ships, a Dornier aircraft, a Chetak helicopter, interceptor boat C-431, and the vessel Sagar Manjusha of the National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT).
The 2018 drill focused on anti-piracy operations, coordinated boarding of suspect vessels, external fire-fighting to salvage burning ships, marine environment protection and joint search-and-rescue. It established a template that the 2nd edition has now expanded upon, both in scale and in the sophistication of the drills.
| Edition | Year | Host Waters | Indian Assets | Vietnamese Asset | Key Focus |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | October 2018 | Bay of Bengal, off Chennai | 3 ships, Dornier aircraft, Chetak helicopter, interceptor boat C-431, NIOT vessel Sagar Manjusha | CSB 8001 with 6-member delegation | Anti-piracy, boarding ops, fire-fighting, SAR, marine environment |
| 2nd | August 2026 | Off Chennai coast | 8 ships and 6 aircraft | CSB 8002 with 6-member delegation | SAR, emergency response standardisation, tactical interoperability, marine pollution response, law enforcement |
Between the two editions, the 7th India-Vietnam Coast Guard High-Level Meeting in August 2026 represented the latest in a series of institutional interactions that have been running since 2001, when Indian Coast Guard ships first began port calls to Vietnam. The steady cadence of delegations, ship visits, professional exchanges and training programmes has built the trust that makes a drill like SAHYOG HOP-TAC possible.
Understanding SAHYOG HOP-TAC and the Coast Guards Behind It
SAHYOG HOP-TAC is a bilateral maritime exercise between the coast guards of India and Vietnam. The name combines a Hindi and a Vietnamese word: “Sahyog” means cooperation in Hindi, while “Hợp tác” means cooperation in Vietnamese. The exercise is designed to enhance interoperability, exchange best practices, and build mutual operational familiarity in maritime safety and security tasks.
The Indian Coast Guard (ICG)
The Indian Coast Guard is an armed force of the Union of India, established on 1 February 1977 and formally inaugurated on 19 August 1978 under the Coast Guard Act, 1978. It functions under the Ministry of Defence and is headquartered in New Delhi. The service is headed by a Director General, an officer of the rank of Vice Admiral.
Under Section 14 of the Coast Guard Act, the ICG is mandated to:
- Ensure the safety and protection of artificial islands, offshore terminals, installations and other structures in maritime zones.
- Provide protection to fishermen and assist them at sea while in distress.
- Preserve and protect the maritime environment and prevent and control marine pollution.
- Assist customs and other authorities in anti-smuggling operations.
- Enforce maritime laws and ensure safety of life and property at sea.
The ICG operates through five Regional Headquarters at Mumbai, Gandhinagar, Chennai, Port Blair and Kolkata, along with numerous district headquarters, air stations and ship stations. Coast Guard Region (East), headquartered in Chennai, was the host of the 2nd SAHYOG HOP-TAC. The current Director General is Paramesh Sivamani, the 26th to hold the post, who assumed charge in October 2024. He is an alumnus of the National Defence College, New Delhi and the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington.
The Vietnam Coast Guard (VCG)
The Vietnam Coast Guard, known in Vietnamese as Cảnh sát biển Việt Nam (CSBVN), was first established as the Vietnam Marine Police on 28 March 1998 under the Ordinance on the Vietnam Marine Police. It was renamed the Vietnam Coast Guard in 2013 to reflect its expanded role beyond traditional policing.
The VCG operates under the Ministry of National Defence of Vietnam and is headquartered in Hanoi. Its current governing legislation is Law No. 33/2018/QH14, passed by the National Assembly on 19 November 2018. The force is structured around a centralised Coast Guard Command, four Regional Coast Guard Commands covering Vietnam’s coastline and Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), reconnaissance bases, anti-crime task bases and a training centre. The VCG operates a fleet of patrol boats, offshore patrol vessels, transport and logistics vessels, search-and-rescue ships, salvage tugs, and patrol aircraft. CSB 8002, the ship that sailed to Chennai for the 2nd edition, belongs to the 8000-series patrol vessels of the VCG.
India-Vietnam Maritime Cooperation: The Broader Framework
SAHYOG HOP-TAC sits inside a much wider India-Vietnam defence partnership that has been building for more than two decades. Bilateral defence relations were given a formal foundation with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding on Defence Cooperation between the two Ministries of Defence in 2009. This was followed in May 2015 by the Joint Vision Statement on Defence Cooperation for the 2015-2020 period, signed during the visit of Vietnamese Defence Minister General Phung Quang Thanh to New Delhi.
That same visit produced the 2015 Memorandum of Understanding between the Indian Coast Guard and the Vietnam Coast Guard on Cooperation, the very framework under which SAHYOG HOP-TAC and the annual High-Level Meetings are now conducted. In September 2016, during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Vietnam, the bilateral relationship was elevated to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.
Defence cooperation has since broadened across multiple tracks:
- Personnel training and capacity building: India has trained Vietnamese submariners at INS Satavahana in Visakhapatnam, supported English-language training centres in Vietnam, and assisted with the repair and upgradation of Soviet-era patrol craft and frigates.
- Defence industry and exports: Five high-speed guard boats were built for Vietnam by Larsen and Toubro under a US$100 million Indian line of credit. India extended a further US$500 million line of credit for defence procurement in 2016, and BrahMos missile negotiations worth around US$700 million have been under discussion.
- Naval ship transfers and visits: India gifted the indigenously built missile corvette INS Kirpan to the Vietnam People’s Navy in 2023, formally handed over at Cam Ranh Bay.
- Vision documents and policy dialogue: The 2022 Joint Vision Statement on India-Vietnam Defence Partnership towards 2030 and the MoU on Mutual Logistics Support, signed during Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s visit to Hanoi, set out the roadmap for the current decade.
- Regular high-level exchanges: Air Chief Marshal A.P. Singh’s visit to Hanoi in August 2026 for talks with General Nguyen Tan Cuong, Chief of the General Staff of the Vietnam People’s Army, came just weeks before the 2nd SAHYOG HOP-TAC, reflecting the steady pace of senior-level engagement.
Vietnam is a key pillar of India’s Act East Policy, the successor to the earlier Look East Policy that took shape in the early 1990s. The two countries share a stated interest in a free, open, inclusive and rules-based Indo-Pacific, with freedom of navigation and overflight, peaceful resolution of disputes, and respect for international law as common principles. For India, deeper maritime cooperation with Vietnam offers a strategic balance in the South China Sea, where China has been expanding its maritime presence. For Vietnam, India is a reliable provider of training, platforms and platforms-related know-how at a time when its own maritime forces are being modernised.
Against this backdrop, the 2nd edition of SAHYOG HOP-TAC is not an isolated drill. It is the visible, operational face of a defence partnership that has been institutionalised through 7 High-Level Meetings, multiple ship visits, capacity-building programmes and a series of vision documents stretching from 2015 to 2030. The Chennai exercise has now added another layer to that architecture by giving personnel from both coast guards the opportunity to understand each other’s procedures, practices and response mechanisms at sea.
Key Takeaways
- The 2nd edition of SAHYOG HOP-TAC, a bilateral maritime exercise between the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) and the Vietnam Coast Guard (VCG), concluded off the Chennai coast on 27 August 2026.
- The Indian Coast Guard deployed 8 ships and 6 aircraft, while the VCG was represented by patrol vessel CSB 8002 and a 6-member delegation.
- The exercise was jointly overseen by ICG Director General Paramesh Sivamani and VCG Vice Commandant Major General Luong Dinh Hung, and followed the 7th ICG-VCG High-Level Meeting held in Chennai on 25 August 2026.
- The first edition of SAHYOG HOP-TAC was held in October 2018, also off the Chennai coast, with Vietnam represented by ship CSB 8001 and India contributing three ships, a Dornier aircraft, a Chetak helicopter and the NIOT vessel Sagar Manjusha.
- The exercise is conducted under the 2015 Memorandum of Understanding between the Indian Coast Guard and the Vietnam Coast Guard on Cooperation, signed during Vietnamese Defence Minister General Phung Quang Thanh’s visit to New Delhi.
- The Indian Coast Guard was formally inaugurated on 19 August 1978 under the Coast Guard Act, 1978, operates under the Ministry of Defence, and is headquartered in New Delhi.
- The Vietnam Coast Guard, originally established as the Vietnam Marine Police on 28 March 1998, was renamed in 2013 and is now governed by Law No. 33/2018/QH14, operating under the Vietnam Ministry of National Defence with headquarters in Hanoi.
- India and Vietnam elevated their relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in September 2016, with defence cooperation anchored by the 2009 MoU on Defence Cooperation, the 2015 Joint Vision Statement, and the 2022 Joint Vision Statement on India-Vietnam Defence Partnership towards 2030.
