Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers Ltd (GRSE) has pitched for an order from Vietnam for supplying 14 fast patrol boats.

AK Verma, Chairman and Managing Director, told reporters here that GRSE was in an advance stage of negotiations for gaining the contract for supply the 35 knots per hour coastal surveillance boats under the India-Vietnam defence cooperation.

Each of these boats would cost around ₹100 crore leading to the total contract size of ₹1,400 crore. If it materialises, it would be the second patrol vessel order served by GRSE for overseas supply. Earlier, GRSE supplied a 20-knot vessel to Mauritius Government for ₹358 crore.

Orders in hand The State-owned shipbuilders having turnover of ₹1,600 crore, currently has orders worth ₹2,400 crore.

“We have supplied 18 patrol boats to Indian Coast Guard. We hope to clinch the order as we have the right credentials,” he said after at an interactive session with Vietnamese envoy Ton Sinh Thanh, organised by the MCC Chamber of Commerce & Industry. During the session, the Ambassador said that Vietnam was seeking to import more cotton, cotton yarn and fabrics from India, which is helping the South-East Asian country set up a textiles park there.

“We also want to reduce our heavy dependence from cotton and yarn supplies from China,” he added. Vietnam is a major exporter of textiles items to the US.

He said in the first half of the current year, Vietnam has imported cotton worth $155 million at an event organised by the MCC Chamber of Commerce & Industry, yarn worth of $50 million and textiles items worth of $65 millions from India.

“Indian firms were invited to set up shops in the proposed textiles park for getting Vietnam’s access to the US and other markets”, the envoy said. The current bilateral trade between the two countries stands at over $8 billion. Some 93 projects from India in Vietnam of worth $1 billion is in the implementation stage. There are three Vietnamese projects worth $23.6 million in India.

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