The major economies of the world have always realised the potential of shipping as a contributor to economic growth. Today, for instance, control of the seas is a key component of China's Belt and Road Initiative. China is trying to take control of the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean Region. However, geographically, China is not as blessed as India. It has a great variety of climates and it has a coast only in the east yet, seven of the top 10 container ports in the world are in China, according to the World Shipping Council. What aided China's growth are strong merchant marine and infrastructure to carry and handle merchandise all over the world. Prior to the 16th century, both India and China were equal competitors on GDP. Historical records prove that India had maritime supremacy in the world. But over the past 70 years, India has lost its global eminence in shipping due to poor legislation and politics. Starting from the establishment of new ports in independent India to the establishment of the present-day Chabahar Port in Iran, all of India's actions on the shipping front have been counter-effective. This is due to a visionless administration. All the shipping infrastructure in peninsular India only helps foreign shipping liners. India has concentrated only on short-term solutions. In the past, colonial traders had strong merchant marine, but they also developed optimum shore-based infrastructure with road and rail connectivity to facilitate their trade. There was balanced infrastructure onshore and at sea. Shore-based infrastructure was developed to cater to the carrying capacity. This needs to be understood with a clear economic sense. Foreign ship owners carry our inbound and outbound cargo. This is the case in container shipping too. As a country, we have still not optimised our carrying capacity. Foreign carriers and their agents continue to ransack EXIM trade with enormous hidden charges in the logistics cycle. Much of foreign currency is drained as transhipment and handling cost every day. Given this state of affairs, members of our maritime business community have also preferred to be agents for foreign ship owners or container liners rather than becoming ship owners or container liners themselves. This is a historical mistake and a major economic failure of the country. As a result, there is a wide gap between carrying capacity and multi-folded cargo growth in the country.