October 2026 marks one year of the ASEAN-India Year of Maritime Cooperation, which delivered naval exercises including the second AIME (with first use of Singapore’s IRIS 2.0), an International Fleet Review and BrahMos deals with Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines.

The Iran war’s disruption of the Strait of Hormuz exposed a core gap: cooperation remains exercise-focused while energy security (nearly 40 percent of India’s crude, 60 percent of LNG and 90 percent of LPG transit Hormuz) and chokepoint risks proved the sharper threat.

The partnership needs to centre energy resilience (oil-sharing, strategic reserves), integrate maritime information centres and institutionalise AIME near Malacca or the Andaman Sea with practical scenarios for tanker protection and disrupted transits.

This month (October) marks one year since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared 2026 as the ‘ASEAN-India Year of Maritime Cooperation’ at an ASEAN-India summit in Kuala Lumpur.  With 2026 nearing its end, its record is better than most years of maritime diplomacy. However, this year also revealed what the partnership still lacks: while India-ASEAN maritime cooperation is built around naval exercises, the real shock of the year was to energy supplies. 

The year delivered on naval exercises, meetings and defence deals. India hosted an International Fleet Review in February, with many ASEAN members as attendees. In September, the second ASEAN-India Maritime Exercise (AIME) was held from 28 September to 2nd October. The exercise featured the first-time use........

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