Chinese rescuers have saved a drowning Indian seaman off Qinhuangdao in China's Hebei Province.

Partsiban Viknesh, a member of the Indian freighter Patalztutra, fell into water about 40 nautical miles off Qinhuangdao on Sunday, when the ship was sailing to South Korea, the Chinese Ministry of Communications said.

Failing to find the missing seaman, the Indian freighter messaged for help to the ministry's Beihai rescue bureau, which immediately dispatched its professional salvage ship Beihai Rescue 108.

The vessel made an estimate of the whereabouts of the missing seaman and outlined a sea area to search, based on the wind and sea flow movements. The rescuers looked for the seaman with infra-red device and torchlights, Xinhua news agency quoted Shen Hao, an official with the ministry as saying.

"The seaman was found in the morning about two nautical miles from the falling point, and he had been struggling in water for more than seven hours," Shen said.

The seaman was so exhausted that he could not even speak, and was sent quickly to a hospital in Qinhuangdao, Shen said, adding more information might be available when he got better.

Interestingly, an Indian ship had saved 11 Chinese crew members from a sinking cargo vessel on March 21 this year near  Philippines.