Essar Shipping has dipped into the secondhand market to acquire a 2000-built panamax bulker, it said in a statement Wednesday.

The acquisition of the 74,000-dwt ship increases the shipowner’s fleet to 14 vessels with a total deadweight capacity of 1.6m.

Essar said the vessel has been renamed Mahavir and will deployed to transport pellets, coal and limestone from Essar Steel’s pellet plant in Paradip to the steel plant in Hazira.