CDS (I) 2021 General Knowledge · Question 19 of 120

Correct — B, 12 nautical miles. The figure is fixed by statute. The Territorial Waters, Continental Shelf, Exclusive Economic Zone and other Maritime Zones Act, 1976, provides in section 3 that the limit of the territorial waters is the line every point of which is at a distance of twelve nautical miles from the nearest point of the appropriate baseline. The same section declares that the sovereignty of India extends, and has always extended, to those waters and to the seabed and subsoil beneath them and the airspace above them — so this belt is not a zone of special rights but Indian territory in the full sense, subject only to the right of innocent passage that international law gives to foreign ships. The Central Government may alter the limit by notification, having regard to international law and State practice, but it has not done so. Twelve is also the maximum any coastal state may claim under the Law of the Sea Convention, which is why the figure is the same the world over.

• (a)10 nautical miles — No basis in Indian law or in the Convention. Claims of three, four or six nautical miles existed historically in various countries, and a few states once claimed far more, but ten was never India's limit and is not the international maximum.
• (c)14 nautical miles — Beyond the maximum a coastal state may claim as territorial sea. Waters between twelve and twenty-four nautical miles from the baseline form the contiguous zone, where India may exercise control over customs, immigration, sanitation and security matters, but they are not territorial waters.
• (d)15 nautical miles — Also inside the contiguous zone rather than the territorial sea. The numbers to hold in order are twelve, twenty-four and two hundred nautical miles — territorial waters, contiguous zone and exclusive economic zone.

A coastal state's authority over the sea weakens in steps as it moves outward from the baseline. Within the territorial sea it has full sovereignty, qualified only by innocent passage. In the contiguous zone it keeps limited enforcement powers over customs, fiscal, immigration and sanitary matters. In the exclusive economic zone it holds sovereign rights over living and non-living resources and over activities such as energy production, while other states retain freedom of navigation and overflight. Beyond that lies the high seas, and the continental shelf may extend further than the exclusive economic zone where the natural prolongation of the land mass justifies it.

This is a number to know exactly rather than to reason towards, and the three wrong options are all placed just outside the correct figure to punish approximate memory. The statute is worth remembering by name because it also supplies the neighbouring numbers — the same Act fixes the contiguous zone at twenty-four nautical miles from the baseline. One clarification that matters in comprehension questions: the nautical mile is about 1.852 kilometres, so twelve nautical miles is roughly 22 kilometres, and baselines are measured from the low-water line or from straight baselines joining points along a deeply indented coast, not from the shore where you happen to be standing.

• The Territorial Waters, Continental Shelf, Exclusive Economic Zone and other Maritime Zones Act, 1976, is Act No. 80 of 28 May 1976.
• Section 3 fixes the territorial waters limit at twelve nautical miles from the nearest point of the appropriate baseline.
• Indian sovereignty extends to the territorial waters, the seabed and subsoil under them and the airspace over them.
• Section 5 fixes the contiguous zone at twenty-four nautical miles from the baseline.
• The exclusive economic zone extends to two hundred nautical miles from the baseline.
• One nautical mile is about 1.852 kilometres, so twelve nautical miles is roughly 22 kilometres.

• Confusing the territorial sea with the exclusive economic zone; the first is twelve nautical miles, the second two hundred.
• Reporting the figure in kilometres from memory; the statute states it in nautical miles.
• Assuming the belt is measured from the visible shoreline rather than from the appropriate baseline.

As a direct number question, or as a statements item pairing each maritime zone with the rights a coastal state enjoys in it.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under Indian law, the contiguous zone extends up to what distance from the baseline?

  • (a)12 nautical miles
  • (b)24 nautical miles
  • (c)100 nautical miles
  • (d)200 nautical miles

  Answer(b) 24 nautical miles — section 5 of the Maritime Zones Act of 1976 fixes it there, and within it India may exercise control over customs, fiscal, immigration and sanitary matters.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  In its exclusive economic zone, a coastal state has

  • (a)full sovereignty equal to that over its land territory
  • (b)sovereign rights over resources, while other states keep freedom of navigation
  • (c)no rights at all, the area being part of the high seas
  • (d)rights only over fisheries and none over minerals

  Answer(b) sovereign rights over resources, while other states keep freedom of navigation — full sovereignty stops at the twelve-nautical-mile territorial sea.