AIME-2026 ASEAN-India Naval Exercise Opens at Subic Bay

The correct answer is Subic Bay, Philippines. The second edition of the ASEAN-India Maritime Exercise began at Subic Bay on 28 September 2026, and the opening ceremony there was graced by Harsh Kumar Jain, India's Ambassador to the Philippines, as Guest of Honour. Option A, Port Blair, is wrong: the drill was hosted abroad rather than at an Indian port, and no part of this edition was held in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Option C, Cam Ranh Bay in Vietnam, is wrong because Vietnam is not the host of this edition even though it is an ASEAN member state whose forces may join such exercises. Option D, Changi in Singapore, is also wrong for the same reason; Singapore is an ASEAN member but the venue named for AIME-2026 is Subic Bay. Candidates should tie the exercise name to the host port and country together, since both are asked.

The correct answer is Anchored in Trust, United at Sea. This is the theme under which the second ASEAN-India Maritime Exercise is being conducted, and it frames the stated aim of the drill, which is to build mutual understanding, cooperation and interoperability between the Indian Navy and ASEAN maritime forces. Options B, C and D are invented slogans of the kind that appear in exercise questions as distractors; none of them is the theme named for this edition. The safest way to hold such a theme in memory is to link it to the exercise and its host, so that the phrase Anchored in Trust, United at Sea is recalled together with AIME-2026 and Subic Bay. Themes of exercises and summits are asked far more often than the drills themselves, so they repay exact learning.

The correct answer is INS Sahyadri and INS Kulish. The Ministry of Defence named these two ships as India's participants in the second ASEAN-India Maritime Exercise at Subic Bay, and described their presence as a mark of the Indian Navy's continuing commitment to maritime partnerships with ASEAN. Option A pairs the aircraft carrier with a destroyer and is wrong, since neither was named for this exercise. Option B names a different frigate and a corvette, and option D names a destroyer and a frigate; none of these four ships was listed in the announcement. Questions on exercises regularly ask which Indian assets took part, so the ship names are worth learning along with the venue and the theme. Here the pair to remember is Sahyadri and Kulish.

The correct answer is Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions. The Ministry of Defence stated that AIME-2026 is being conducted in furtherance of India's Act East Policy and of the MAHASAGAR vision, and gave this expansion of the acronym. Options A, C and D are plausible sounding but invented expansions built from the same maritime vocabulary, which is exactly how such distractors are framed in examinations. Acronym questions are common in the defence and international sections, and MAHASAGAR is a relatively new one, so it is likely to be repeated across cycles. Note also the twin framing in the announcement: the exercise serves both the Act East Policy and MAHASAGAR, and a question may ask for either of the two.