GP Rating
Age Requirements
Minimum Age: 17.5 Years | Maximum Age: 28 Years
SC/ST: 5 Years Relaxation | OBC (NCL): 3 Years | Female: 2 Years
GP Rating
Eligibility Criteria
HBIMS-NAF&SA™ is open to young Indian citizens who meet the following academic, physical, and medical requirements. We also offer age relaxations for reserved categories as per government norms.
Education
10th Pass with minimum 40% Aggregate and 40% in English
Alternative: 2-Year ITI (Government Approved) with 50% marks
Vision & Medical
Eyesight: 6/6 (both eyes) | No Colour Blindness
Must be medically fit per DGMA standards
Physical Standards
Minimum Height: 157 cm | BMI: 18–25
No Physical Deformity
Medical
MedicalDGMA Medical Fitness Standards
Every aspirant must clear a DGMA approved medical exam before joining. The medical is conducted at a DGS-empanelled clinic. HBIMS facilitates booking but never influences the outcome.
Vision Standards
Distant Vision 6/6 in each eye. No colour blindness (Ishihara test). No squint, no night blindness. Spectacles permitted for engine cadets, not deck.
Test: Ishihara + SnellenPhysical Standards
Minimum Height 157 cm (5'2"). BMI Range 18.0 – 25.0. Chest expansion ≥ 5 cm. Swim test: 50 m + 5 min float.
Pool Test: Mandatory
Disqualifying Conditions
Hypertension, epilepsy, diabetes. Hearing impairment. Substance dependency or psychiatric history.
Re-test: Not permitted
Documentation
DocumentationThe 8-Document Dossier
Every aspirant under NAF&SA submits a standardised dossier. The dossier is the institutional handover from HBIMS to the chosen MTI — every document, signed, scanned, and verified before the MTI receives the file.
- 10th Mark-sheet & CertificateOriginal + 2 attested copies
- Aadhaar CardLinked mobile, e-KYC verified
- PAN CardFor fee payment compliance
- PassportMin 5-year validity remaining
- Birth CertificateMunicipal or matriculation
- DGS Medical CertificateFrom empanelled doctor
- Category CertificateSC/ST/OBC-NCL (if applicable)
- Parent Consent FormHBIMS Annexure C, signed
Eligibility
EligibilityWhy these standards exist
Each requirement traces back to something operational rather than to institutional preference. Age limits reflect the length of training and the sea service needed before certification. Educational requirements reflect the mathematics and physics that navigation and marine engineering genuinely use.
Medical standards are the most misunderstood and the least negotiable. Colour vision matters because navigation lights, flags and instrument displays are colour-coded and misreading them at night has consequences. Physical fitness matters because emergency response aboard a moving vessel is physically demanding and cannot be delegated.
Eligibility
What to check before you apply
Confirm your date of birth against the age window for your chosen route, applying any category relaxation you qualify for. Confirm your qualification actually matches the route, particularly the physics and mathematics requirement where it applies.
Have your colour vision and general fitness checked informally before committing money to anything, because these are the two that most often surprise candidates at the formal stage and neither can be corrected quickly.
Check that names and dates match exactly across every certificate you hold. Mismatches are ordinary and fixable, but only if you find them months before an intake rather than days before a deadline.
Eligibility
If you do not meet a standard
Some criteria are fixed and some are route-specific. A candidate outside the window for one entry may sit comfortably within it for another, and a qualification that closes one door often opens a different one at the same eventual rank.
Where no route is currently open, the honest answer is to say so rather than to accept an application. That is the entire purpose of checking eligibility before payment, and it is the point at which an organisation's incentives become visible.
Age Matrix
Age MatrixAge Limits & Category Relaxations
DGMA has fixed entry age windows. Under-age applications cannot be processed. Government category relaxations apply as per the current Government of India OBC/SC/ST list.
| Category | Min Age | Max Age | Relaxation Applied |
|---|---|---|---|
| General / Open | 17.5 yrs | 25 yrs | No relaxation |
| OBC (Non-Creamy Layer) | 17.5 yrs | 28 yrs | +3 years · Valid OBC-NCL Cert |
| SC / ST | 17.5 yrs | 30 yrs | +5 years · Valid Caste Cert |
| Female Candidates | 17.5 yrs | 27 yrs | +2 years · All categories |
| PwBD (Bench-Marked Disability) | 17.5 yrs | Case-wise | Subject to DGMA medical |
