On the face of it, recreating a fourth-century stitched ship, which can undertake a voyage from India to Oman, may sound simple. In reality, though, it can have its own set of challenges and dilemmas.
That is what author and member of the Prime Minister’s economic advisory council Sanjeev Sanyal, who’s pushing the maritime project, is discovering.
On Tuesday, at an event at the International Centre Goa (ICG), the naval historian, who has authored The Ocean of Churn and Land of the Seven Rivers, shared that they still had to demystify many “elements” of the ancient ship to make it seaworthy.
Even as he was optimistic of beginning the trial sailing of the stitched ship by mid next year (2025), he enumerated the engineering challenges of building a fourth-century ship in the twenty-first century.
“There are still many elements of the (ancient stitched) ship, which are really not understood. The trailing edge doesn’t have a proper rudder. The hull of the ship is slightly flexible. Its centre of gravity is different. It has square sails,” said Sanyal, who wants to stick to the architectural and engineering design of the centuries-old ship, but not at the cost of compromising safety.
For instance, most ships in olden times were not aerodynamic and, therefore, relied as much on the sea current as they did on the wind. One of the reasons for this was their square sails.
Sanyal said the idea of building an ancient stitched ship was born from the need to instill “pride in the maritime history” in every Indian, and not so much to revive the old shipbuilding techniques; “we have not really given our maritime history enough attention”.
A similar bid was undertaken by the Omani government, when they reconstructed a nineth-century stitched ship – Jewel of Muscat – in 2010.
It was modelled after an ancient Omani trading ship, whose wreckage was discovered off the coast of Indonesia in 1989. The Jewel of Muscat sailed from Muscat to Singapore with a crew of mixed nationalities, weathering a cyclone and tough sailing conditions.
Captain Saleh Said Mohammed Al Jabri, a retired official of the Royal Navy of Oman, who was the captain of the ship, narrated his five-month experience of sailing on the recreated ancient ship. With practically no information on how to navigate the ship, he said it was “very, very difficult”.
“The temperature, sometimes, rose to 45-48 degrees Celsius. There was no fridge. How did our forefathers do it? When there was no wind, the current would take us back instead of forward because of the current,” he said.
Elaborating on his experience on the ship, Captain Jabri said, “In the cyclone zone, the wind speed was 120-125 km per hour. It was amazing to see the lightning. I have never seen something like this. (I have seen it) only in action films.”
The Indian team also has no instruction manual to fall back on except for a Kutchi manual from the fourteenth century.
He said because of the wind velocity, the mast of ship cracked, but stronger sails saved the day for them till they could replace the mast. In one instance, when the Omani ship was flooded, every sailor was tasked with “pumping out” 600-700 litres of water from it “with hand” every day.
Sanyal is apprised of such challenges and is better prepared to face them once his stitched ship is ready for a sea voyage. Currently, it is being given shape on Goa’s riverine Divar island by shipwright Babu Shankaran and team.
The Indian team also has no instruction manual to fall back on except for a Kutchi manual from the fourteenth century, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had translated when he was Gujarat’s chief minister.
However, Sanyal, who is not sure how much they can rely on this manual, said, “The problem is, at least, I could not make head or tail of it, neither the navy. They (navy) are still trying to figure out how to use it.
The rebuilt ancient stitched ship is slated to set sail on its first voyage from Mandvi port in Gujarat to Muscat in Oman in December, 2025.
It is very difficult to interpret what they are doing. It is possible we may use an older technique but, of course, for emergency purpose we will carry GPS and other modern equipment (as backup).”
The economic advisor to the government is also reluctant to use naked flames or carry water in earthen pots, as was done in ancient times, on the ship.
“We will cheat and use jerry cans for carrying water (instead of earthen pots). We will also have no naked flames. It’s dangerous even if we train people. We will use electricity light at night. We do not want to carry an oil tanker. We are ready to break some rules for safety. We will not compromise there,” he said.
And so, if things go as per schedule, the recreated unnamed ancient stitched ship (Sanyal said it will be named soon), would be launched early 2025, and its trials would begin in the middle of next year.
He said a crew of Indian sailors is being put together by the Indian Navy and will be trained for the voyage on the rebuilt ancient stitched ship.
It is slated to set sail on its first voyage from Mandvi port in Gujarat to Muscat in Oman in December, 2025. The second voyage would be from the eastern coast of Odisha to Bali in Indonesia in November 2026 on Karthik Purnima, the day people in Odisha celebrate Bali Jatra.
The government-backed project is funded by the ministry of culture and supported by the Indian Navy and ministries of external affairs and shipping.