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The question hangs in the air, heavy with the weight of rusted steel and unspoken tragedy. It was asked in the hallowed halls of the Lok Sabha, a starred question demanding accountability: “How many workers have died in Alang’s shipbreaking yards?”

The official answer, laid on the table of the House on February 6, 2026, was a masterclass in bureaucratic deflection. It spoke of conventions, acts, rules, trauma centres, and monitoring. It declared that safety had been “significantly enhanced.” But on the specific number of lives lost—the very core of the question—there was a resounding, telling silence.

The Echo in the Silence

When the Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways states that fatalities are “being monitored” but does not provide the data, what are we to understand? The absence of a number in an official reply to a direct parliamentary query is not an oversight; it is a statement in itself.

For decades, Alang—a 10-kilometer stretch of coastline in Gujarat—has been the world’s largest graveyard for ships and, by tragic extension, a graveyard for too many of the men who break them. They are the invisible army who walk the brittle decks of obsolete tankers, torch through steel laced with asbestos and heavy metals, and work in the shadow of thousand-ton hulls that can collapse without warning.

Between the Lines of “Compliance”

The government’s answer highlights the Hong Kong Convention (HKC), the Recycling of Ships Act, 2019, and new Regulations of 2026. This is the “what.” It showcases a framework.

But the grieving families in Odisha, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Jharkhand—the states that supply the migrant labour for Alang—ask the “who” and the “how many.” They ask about the last phone call, the missed safety harness, the explosive spark in a gas-filled chamber, the slow, painful cough from asbestos exposure that surfaces years later.

A Level-III Trauma Centre is cited as progress. And it is. But it is also an admission—a testament to the expected severity and frequency of injuries that require the highest level of emergency care.

Why the Number Matters

A number is not just a statistic. It is:

• Accountability: It allows us to measure the true cost of our cheap steel and the price of our maritime economy.
• Trend Analysis: Is the “significantly enhanced safety” claim reflected in a declining death toll? Without a baseline, the claim is meaningless.
• Dignity: Each digit is a life with a name, a family, and a story. Erasure from official records is the final insult.

The government mentions monitoring by the Directorate of Industrial Safety and Health (DISH) and the Gujarat Pollution Control Board. This data exists. Its omission from the parliamentary answer suggests a choice was made—to focus on policy over people, on future promise over past pain.

The Global Lens

India, now a party to the Hong Kong Convention, seeks to project itself as a responsible, global leader in “green” ship recycling. This leadership cannot be built on a foundation of unnumbered dead. Transparency is the first pillar of true reform. Turkey and Bangladesh, our competitors, face similar scrutiny. The global shipping industry and NGOs like the Shipbreaking Platform compile annual casualty lists that often contradict local narratives, creating a crisis of credibility.

The Way Forward: From Framework to Facts

The new 2026 Regulations will be judged not by their text, but by their impact on the ground. That impact must be measured in cold, hard, public data:

1. Mandatory, Publicly Accessible Registers: Of fatalities, injuries, and diagnosed occupational diseases, published annually by the Competent Authority.
2. Causation Reports: Understanding how deaths occur is key to preventing them. Was it a fall, fire, explosion, or structural collapse?
3. Inclusion of Long-Term Deaths: The industry’s toll includes cancers and lung diseases that kill years after exposure. Compensation schemes must acknowledge this.

The question asked in Parliament was the right one. The silence in the answer was the wrong one.

The men of Alang do not work in conventions or acts. They work in a tangible, brutal, and hazardous reality. Honouring their labour—and their lives—begins with the simple, courageous act of counting them.

The story of India’s shipbreaking industry will only cease to be a tragedy when the first answer to “How many have died?” is a clear, honest number, followed immediately by the decisive action that makes that number zero.

This blog is based on the analysis of the Lok Sabha Q&A No. 116, answered on 06.02.2026, regarding the occupational and environmental hazards of shipbreaking in India.