"The ship received a distress call from MV Lord Mountbatten, in position 230 nm South-West in the Gulf of Aden.

"The vessel had reported an incident of attempted piracy by two suspicious mother vessels along with 7-8 skiffs. Sharda, which was at that time 30 Nm East of the reported position, immediately responded to the distress call and proceeded at best speed to investigate the incident," Navy Spokesperson Capt DK Sharma said.

One automatic Kalashnikov rifle and 28 rounds of magazines were also recovered from one of the dhows, he said.

Indian Naval assets have been increasingly deployed in recent times to address the various maritime concerns of the region, including piracy off the coast of Somalia.

The navies of India and China last month had rescued a merchant ship in the Gulf of Aden after it was hijacked by Somali pirates.

Indian Navys two frontline warships, INS Mumbai and INS Tarkash were part of the operation while the Chinese Navy had deployed missile frigate Yulin.

However, China had not acknowledged participation of Indian Navy in the operation. PTI MPB ZMN