Maritime Maverick Captain Sharma Linked to Global Shipping Incidents and Fraudulent Registries

Captain Suniel Kumar Sharma is a central figure in multiple international maritime incidents involving aging vessels and falsified documentation. His activities include a shipwreck in India, an ammunition seizure in Senegal, and an oil tanker raid in Malaysia. For over a decade, governments including Dominica, Guyana, Samoa, the Federated States of Micronesia, and Eswatini, along with the UN International Maritime Organisation (IMO), have condemned Sharma for issuing fraudulent paperwork and false flag certificates to ships.

Despite Sharma's recent claims to the Financial Times that his prominent flag registry, the International Maritime Safety Agency of Guyana (IMSAG), is no longer active, a Bellingcat investigation uncovered certificates issued by IMSAG as recently as December 2025. Furthermore, Sharma denied establishing additional registries, yet evidence points to a newly launched website connected to him that offers flag registration services in Nicaragua. These findings contradict his public statements and suggest ongoing operations in the shadowy world of maritime registration.

One notable incident involves the MT Basra Star, a 38-year-old oil tanker that ran aground off the Indian coast in June 2020 during a typhoon. An insurance inspector's report recommended its immediate demolition, but the vessel remained on the beach for five years before being scrapped in January of this year. The report indicated the Basra Star was sailing under a Samoan flag, with Ascent Navals as its classification society, despite warnings issued two years prior by the Samoan government and the IMO about Ascent Navals and its director, Captain Suniel Kumar Sharma, for operating without official authorization.