India initiated underwater archaeological research in 1981 by establishing Marine Archaeology Centre in the National Institute of Oceanography at Goa. Though developed late, Marine Archaeology, a nascent branch of archaeology is a fast developing discipline in India.

At present the Marine Archaeology Centre at the National Institute of Oceanography has a well established team of Archaeologists trained in diving, and capable of carrying out literature search, identifying and understanding the importance of antiquities, and also able to properly document underwater a finding before retrieval. We have the necessary infrastructure for diving including compressors, underwater TV/still cameras, ROVs, and our archaeologists have the required certification from both Indian and US schools of diving, to dive down to water depths upto 30 m. We are therefore, as such, self-sufficient in marine archaeology.