Exercise Samudra Shakti

In News

• The Indian Navy and the Indonesian Navy are taking part in a bilateral maritime exercise, known as ‘Samudra Shakti’.

Key Points

• About:
  • The two-day exercise is being held near to Sunda Strait.
    • A strait is a naturally formed, narrow, typically navigable waterway that connects two larger bodies of water. Most commonly it is a channel of water that lies between two landmasses.
  • It was started in 2018, as a bilateral exercise under India’s “Act East Policy”.

• Objective:

• To strengthen the bilateral relationship,
• To enhance mutual understanding 
• Bolstering interoperability in maritime operations between the two navies in the Indo-Pacific region.

• Tasks on hand:
  • It will include complex maritime operations, such as air defence serials, weapon firings, cross deck landings, military interdiction operations, replenishment approaches, and tactical manoeuvres.

Importance of Sunda Strait

• It links the Java Sea (Pacific Ocean) with the Indian Ocean (south). 
• Sunda Strait, Indonesian Selat Sunda, is a channel, 26–110 km wide, between the islands of Java and Sumatra. 
• The Sunda Strait is an important passage connecting the Indian Ocean with eastern Asia.
• Deterrents:

• It is notoriously difficult to navigate because of this shallowness, very strong tidal currents, sandbanks, and man-made obstructions such as oil platforms off the Java coast.

Image Courtesy: Sea-seek

Source: PIB