Category: Navy – No One Asked Me But…

As Director,  College of Naval Warfare in Mumbai, in the year 2008; I took the Naval Higher Command Course student officers with me to a tour of South Africa and Mauritius. In Mauritius we visited the Folk Museum of Indian Immigration.  We were surprised to see the records of all indentured labourers who came to British Mauritius from Bihar between 1834 and 1921 (the museum houses 2000 volumes of these). In the year 1835, slavery was abolished in Mauritius and hence these were called indentured labourers.

Similarly, if you go to the Cellular Jail in Port Blair, you would be stunned at the painstaking way in which the British maintained the records of all the prisoners brought from India to the jail that came to be known as Kala Pani (Black Water). The British were cruel and committed untold atrocities on Indian slaves, but, they were much better than us for their record-keeping or documentation.

When I saw Satyajit Ray’s Shatranj Ke Khiladi I was surprised to see in the end that almost all the credits and acknowledgments of Indian history records were to the Britishers.

We learnt many a thing from our rulers but we didn’t learn from them this due diligence in record keeping. This has resulted in many an embarrassing situation. After the Kargil War in July 1999, Grenadier Yogendra Singh Yadav was awarded the highest military honour: The Param Vir Chakra. His citation read that he was being awarded this posthumously. It was a big relief and huge embarrassment for Army Headquarters to know that he was actually alive. The Armed Forces of India are at perpetual war with the Indian bureaucracy for the step-motherly treatment that they often get (the present OROP controversy is one of the examples). However, it is a fact that we are equally poor in record keeping at least. Please read: Rediff On The NeT Army battling to correct its Param Vir mistakes.

We have had an Army Chief who embarrassed the nation no end through challenging the record of his own date of birth (Read ‘Army Chief’s Age – The Other Issues’, ‘Hats Off To General VK Singh’ and ‘Indian Army Before And After Operation Vijay’).

After the infamous 26/11 Mumbai Attacks, Indian government handed over two demarches to Pakistan. Amongst other things, the demarches asked for the arrest of and handing over of about 20 persons including gangster Dawood Ibrahim, Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist leader Maulana Masood Azhar and Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafeez Mohammad Saeed. It was widely reported in the Indian newspapers that the list also included at least four names of “hardened criminals” enjoying “immunity” in Pakistan when actually they were held in Indian prisons.

We fought a major war with China in 1962. Fifty three years later, we still do not have an officially accepted record of the history of the war. The Henderson Brooks-Bhagat report, also referred to as the Henderson Brooks report, is the report of an analysis (Operations Review) of the Sino-Indian of 1962. Its authors are Indian Army officers: Lieutenant-General TB Henderson Brooks and Brigadier Premindra Singh Bhagat, Commandant of the Indian Military Academy at that time. However, the report has not been declassified even though there has been hue and cry about its publication.

Why do we, as a nation and armed forces, land up in this mess? The reason appears to lie in the glory and glamour attached to operations and looking down on administrative skills. The armed forces have a Defence Services Staff College in Wellington (Nilgiris) to teach the middle ranking armed forces officers administrative skills. However, when an armed forces officer lands up after the Staff Course, say, in Naval Headquarters, he quickly finds out that practically it is so different from what has been theoretically taught to him. Many have realised that locating an earlier letter or file is a virtual impossibility. Hence, an armed forces officer is most likely to indulge in what is known as reinventing the wheel when it comes to long-standing issues (these are “long-standing” because of the babus in the Ministry of Defence).

In the IAF, for example, fliers want to do flying all the times. Attending courses, for them, is considered beneath their macho spirit. When I underwent Higher Command course with the Army (I did HC 25 in the year 1996-97), I was able to learn from my IAF counterparts that officers pull strings to get out of attending courses so that they can continue doing what they like most: flying.

On the lighter side, after leaving the Navy in end Feb 2010, I have found that my name and address held in various departments in the Western Naval Command has rarely been correct. Because of this, many a times, I have missed important meetings and functions. I have tried my best in the last five years to get the records corrected by writing mails with my correct name and address and have personally visited the Command Headquarters to get these corrected. However, so strong is our inclination to be administratively poor that until now I haven’t received many letters with my correct name and address.

Another curious thing that I have discovered is that in the header of the mail from an official/authority in the Armed Forces, if a telephone number is given, it is rarely of the officer signing it. If you have a query regarding the letter that you have received and you dial this number, you are likely to get connected to the clerk who typed out the letter and he would have no idea of what you are asking.

The Army Headquarters are the worst in this. At one time an opportunity arose in my corporate to employ retired Major Generals for some very senior billets. Through my friends in Naval Headquarters, I got in touch with the Army Headquarters (MS Branch). The officer there seemed to understand my request for the names of a few Major Generals who had just retired. However, after a few days when I was expecting a list from him, I received a mail asking me to spell out my requirement again by mail (this is a favourite ploy with all services headquarters). A phone number and Fax number was given at the letter head. Fifteen days of unsuccessfully trying to get in touch on those numbers left me totally drained out.

On the First of July this year, my course completed 40 years of having received President’s Commission. I retired five years back and likewise with my coursemates except those who retired as Rear and Vice Admirals later. All of us were full of nostalgia about our active time in the Navy. As if to bring me down to mother earth, just a day prior to that, on 30th June, I received a letter from the Pension Cell in Naval Pay Office that my Genform (a General Information order regarding movements of personnel) for having retired on 28th Feb 2010 had not been received by them. It has been only five and half years. Perhaps in another half a decade they would get it. Nothing changes; we are proud of our administrative inefficiency despite the computer age and improved means of communications.

In the first episode of ‘The Tail Wags The Dog And How!’ I had told you about the business end of the Navy being at sea; but, controlled by the ‘heads’ in headquarters who have specialised in dishing out detailed instructions on every conceivable subject. It is as if their efficiency is directly proportional to the number of reams of paper that they dish out.

All of us have been at both ends; but, we seem to forget our travails at sea the moment we are at headquarters.

Once, when I was the Command Communications Officer at Headquarters, Eastern Naval Command, Visakhapatnam, we were conducting an operation that involved shore based aircraft, ships and a small Seaward Defence Boat (SDB) in the Palk Bay. We had put all the craft at sea on a Common Fixed Net. Every SITREP (Situation Report) and every instruction was passed to everyone so that “everyone would be in the picture”. Good idea? Well, hours went by and we found that the SDB wasn’t reacting to any of the instructions that we had sent it. Series of meetings were held in the MOR (Maritime Operations Room; now MOC, ie, Maritime Operations Centre). In one of the meetings late in the night, the Chief of Staff asked me why was the SDB not responding to the volley of our instructions. My reply: “Sir, the SDB has received the messages but it has not decrypted them; we haven’t given it long enough pause when it can do so, what with a single communication operator on watch”.

If you think the communication gap between headquarters and units at sea is one way only, you are sadly mistaken. In every Command there is something called a Command Meeting that is held on quarterly basis in a year and hence called QCM or Quarterly Command Meeting . All Commanding Officers, Directors, and Officers-in-Charge attend the meeting together with Headquarters big-wigs, Fleet Staff and other concerned authorities ashore, for example, from Materiel Organisation and Naval Dockyard. For an agenda point to come up to the level of the QCM, it would have originated with the ships a few months ago. Out of all the points received, the Command Staff would select only those points that they consider significant points; this expression roughly translated into ‘points that they (the Command Staff) has some clue/answer about’. And yet, the decisions on most points after deep discussions at QCMs are that the points need to be deliberated further. At this stage, the C-in-Cs, seized with the desire to be seen pro-units-at-sea, direct that the concerned point be kept open until a solution is found.

Sometimes, the Command Staff would select a point so as to show-down a ship or unit that would have raised it. The ultimate idea would be to bring out how poorly informed the ship/unit would be in bringing out an unnecessary point for which the solution already existed within the resources already made available to the ship. Discussions on such points show the Command Staff being ahead of the genuine needs of the ship.

In one of the QCMs, I remember, one of the small missile-boats put up an agenda point that missile boats under refit should be given the services of a lighter transport so as to land defective motors, pumps etc at the various centres of the dockyard. After considerable discussion, the Commanding Officer was asked to specify the number of trips that such a lighter would be required for, render his report in a month’s time, so as to enable the Command Staff to arrive at a workable solution. I met the Commanding Officer during the tea-break and he was vowing never to put up an agenda point again.

The point is that the ‘heads’ at headquarters have the ship’s heads easily outnumbered and can beat them in discussions, debates, analyses and research on points. The ship’s staff who give these agenda points never learn this simple truth.

In one of the QCMs, a point was given by me that the Headquarters take a long time in responding to the points given by the ships and units. For some reason, the point was selected as an agenda point by the heads at the headquarters. The decision given was that there should be no issue from the ships that should be kept pending for more than a fortnight. Various colour schemes were worked out by the heads at the headquarters. If a solution is provided, it would be viewed as a Green issue. If it was kept pending for a month, it would be deemed as Amber issue. And if after a month, the response wasn’t given, it would be deemed as Red issue.

Excellent solution? Well, after six months of this colour scheme being in vogue, one fine day, I received an important mail from headquarters that read: “Your quarterly return of Red, Amber and Green issues not yet received; request expedite.” You can’t beat the heads at headquarters; people like afloat people who change overnight the moment they walk the corridors of headquarters.

I came across several exceptions to the rule too and these are the people who take it upon themselves to do something rather than write something. Let me give you three examples to tell you how easy is the former option. One of these was a  Senior Staff Officer (Budget) at Headquarters, Western Naval Command. I visited him once with a hand delivered letter asking for a sanction under I & M Grant (Incidentals and Miscellaneous Grant) for buying office accessories. When I wanted to deliver the letter to one of the clerks in his office, the clerk asked me to deliver it personally to saab. Saab was a Captain and I was sure he’d take it amiss for an officer from subordinate unit seeing him directly for a petty matter. He had one look at it, went out with it to the clerk I had seen earlier, came back and got busy in phone calls and other office work. Fifteen minutes went by and I was feeling fidgety that my letter wasn’t receipted. Another ten minutes and I was now feeling totally depressed and told him that it doesn’t take that much time to give a receipt to a letter. At this juncture the clerk came in with a file on which my letter asking for sanction was there and – hold your breath – a sanction letter!

Another was Logistic Officer-in-Charge of the Naval Pay Office. Before retiring from the Navy in the year 2010, I phoned him about how long would it take for me to start receiving pension. He enquired whether I had completed the booklet of forms sent by Naval Headquarters and he would use my case as a test case for obtaining pension within a week. And he did. He is now a Flag Officer at Naval Headquarters. I rejoiced the day he was promoted.

I have dozens of these examples too.

However, for the vast majority, staff work, file-work, and need to be stickler to rules and regulations keep the tail wagging the dog.

This majority has an answer to every problem of yours in the form of yet another detailed instructions.

The business end of the Navy is at sea: the ships, submarines and aircraft; the Navy being the truly three-dimensional force amongst the armed forces of the union of India. However, the Navy has something common with the other forces in that it has another dimension ashore: the headquarters. The headquarters has – hold your breath – heads; what else? These heads roll out stuff that people at sea sometimes find difficult to comprehend.

Do you remember the story of a Russian trying to sell a radio set to a farmer in Siberia, by his sales-pitch: “With this radio set, comrade, you can be in any part of Russia and still be able to hear Moscow”?

The farmer, in the story, wasn’t impressed and asked: “But, do you have anything by which Moscow can hear us?”

It is the same disconnect between headquarters and units at sea sometimes. It appears to people at sea that these ‘heads’ ashore dish out reams and reams of paper on every conceivable subject. Lets say, for example, that a VIP Visitor on board puts his or her hand/foot/other parts of body exactly where the sign says: ‘Wet Paint; Don’t Touch’; the headquarters are likely to issue detailed instructions titled: ‘Instructions For Receiving VIPs on Board Ships And Submarines’ complete with several appendices and annexures.

They expect you to read and follow the plethora of these instructions. However, your one or even half pager enumerating problems on board doesn’t see the light of the day. If you insist on a response and send some gentle reminders, you are likely to get a cryptic reply: “Refer to your Letter such and such dated such and such. Your attention is drawn to WENCO (Western Naval Command Orders) such and such, article such and such.”

In case you are a persistent one and notice that the article in question doesn’t exist, you can write another letter bringing out that the quoted article doesn’t exist. But then, you are back to square one. As also, you, busy in getting your point across to headquarters, missed sending them the fortnightly return on VIP Visitors on Board as asked for by Appendix P of Letter regarding ‘Instructions For Receiving VIPs On Board Ships And Submarines’. Headquarters and Police are two unique organisations where the customer is always wrong.

Captain KK Kohli on newly commissioned Ganga had got fed-up of headquarters indulgence in every matter on board except where their inputs were specifically requested for. Once we received detailed instructions on receiving some foreign dignitaries on board including a lavish lunch for them post PLD (Pre Lunch Drinks). KKK requested for a sanction for X Rupees. As always, headquarters approved an amount X divided by 50. Headquarters heads do this kind of thing for no r or r. The sanction letter said the menu for the party may be sent for C-in-C’s approval.

KKK’s reply was classic:

“1. Refer to HQWNC Letter such and such dated such and such.

2. Based on Headquarters sanction, the menu for the party would be:

a) Half pint of beer for half the people and Nimbupaani for the other half.
b) Rice and dal for lunch together with PPK.
c) One Eclair each as dessert.”

Needless to say the heads at headquarters saw not just the comedy in KKK’s mail but also merit. A fresh sanction letter of X amount was released and……this was to be seen to be believed……there was no mention of sending “draft menu for C-in-C’s approval”.

The Navy owns ships, submarines and aircraft. But, to commute on land you require road transport. That’s where the Navy finds itself totally at sea.

We envy our Army counterparts whose jeeps, jongas and Ambassador cars look ‘battle-worthy’ from outside and are fitted with the latest luxury items inside if the allotment is even for a unit Officer-in-Charge.

The one Achilles Heel of the Navy personnel has always continued being road transport in general, and staff-cars in particular. Let’s say the Navy finally deems it fit to provide you with a staff-car, as a Captain/Commodore, just a few years before retirement, it would be competing with the Chhakdas (that you see in the Saurashtra region: they are indigenously designed from Royal Enfield mobikes) for comfort and looks. The chances are that the Chhakada would take you places but your staff-car won’t.

The Navy makes you a practising communicator the moment you are given a staff car. You communicate your next day’s requirement to the civilian driver when you secure him. But, come the morning, you make series of calls to the Naval Transport Pool (NT Pool) enquiring as to what happened to the transport. It would be nothing less than an hour and two dozen calls when you learn that either the transport or the driver has packed up.

And imagine this happening before Command Divisions. You are resplendent in your ceremonial rig, complete with a sword and shining brass on your peak-cap, you look yourself in the mirror several times to congratulate yourself at having arrived in life. The timings of sailors and officers arriving at the venue have been fixed and rehearsed and then, to your horror, you find that the transport has failed to report. No phone calls can help now. You start your own car, rush to the venue and find that the parking for self-driven cars is about a kilometre away from the venue. You lock the car, and run to the venue, ruffled and sweating and a far cry from the proud officer who viewed himself in the mirror indulgently just half an hour back.

I was once an Admiral-in-the-waiting (for the simple reason that no Admiral was free that day and I was the senior most Commodore) for a visiting PLA (Navy) (People’s Liberation Army (Navy) of China) Admiral. My staff-car R42 (the number specifies how far have you reached in the Command; C-in-C’s are R1 and  R2 and so on) finally arrived after several calls and heart-burns to take me to the airport to receive this Chinese Admiral. One thing curious about this car was that it made more noise than speed. But, even at that, through my constant communication with the driver, we managed to arrive at the airport just as the dignitaries were stepping into the arrival lounge. They had to go to the ITC Maratha hotel, close to the airport terminal, for dinner and I smartly took a seat next to the Admiral in his Merc and we reached the hotel. I espied through the corners of my eyes (if you are in the armed forces, you realise that the corners of your eyes are far more important than the eyes themselves) that my car was not following. During the dinner I made several trips outside to look for R42 and found that all the other cars in the convoy had arrived except for the elusive R42. Finally, when the Admiral was getting into his Merc to go back to the airport to catch a flight to New Delhi, I learnt that R42, true to its form had packed up at the airport itself. The Chinese Admiral pretended (they all do) that he didn’t know English and Hindi but, when he was getting down at the airport terminal, his ‘interpreter’ told me that the Admiral had instructed his driver to drive me back home after seeing off the delegation.

Various fascinating experiences with transport or staff-cars in the Navy that I have experienced or heard would make into a serialised book in various volumes. However, here are some of the pippins:

• I was once a DSO (Duty Staff Officer) at Naval Headquarters and I was to take rounds of the units at great distances from NHQ in Delhi. Invariably, my communication skills with the NT Pool at INS India never produced the transport on time and there were occasions when I had taken rounds in the middle of the night instead of at 8 pm. After that, in the Night Rounds Book we were to write ‘Rounds correct’ or otherwise and sign. I noticed that the book never had an ‘otherwise’ entry. So, one day, I wrote in red ‘Rounds not correct as transport did not report’. This book was periodically inspected by CO India. The next time when I did my duty again as DSO, I noticed that the CO had signed but there was no action whatsoever.
• In Goa, once, a Staff Officer (Operations) had to receive a visiting ship on the jetty. His communications to the NT Pool fell on deaf ears and finally, when the hour of reckoning drew close, he screamed that come what may some transport had to report to him. After twenty minutes, to his shocked surprise, he found a mobile-crane waiting outside his residence to take him to the jetty about six kms away.

• When the Government of India letter came about with sanction of transport for all officers in the Navy from residence to place of work, provided the distance was more than 1 kilometre, a C-in-C, before admitting the claims of a few officers, got the distance physically measured with a measuring tape. So, in the same colony, if your house happened to be 987 metres away from office, you were denied to claim for road transport but in the very next building an officer enjoyed the privilege.
• We were privileged once with a visit by the Assistant Chief of Naval Staff (Policy and Plans) to our station, Vizag. All along, officers were denied road transport due to “lack of funds”. This ACNS (P&P) in an open forum attended by all Command officers ‘not-on-essential-duties’, in answer to a query by a young officer, brought out that Naval Headquarters had made adequate funds available to the Command for hiring of transport, but that, his record showed that the Command had been returning large portions of these funds unused year after year.
• In a Command meeting once I brought out that the rates of hiring of transport by NT Pool were significantly more than in the Port Trust wherein I was a Trustee. I was ‘excommunicated’ for deliberately not understanding the ‘compulsions’ of the NT Pool.

But, the real pippin is this experience of mine as a young Acting Sub-Lieut when I was appointed to INS Himgiri for earning my Watch-keeping certificate. Our CO, as Commander, was to share his allotted staff-car with two other COs of Durg class of corvettes. These COs, despite their best communication, never got the staff-car since our CO was the senior most and his own requirements didn’t leave anything for the others.

Once, when the staff-car reported at our gangway to take our CO for an important Fleet Office meeting, our CO observed just before leaving the ship that curiously a Midshipman occupied the right rear seat whilst our CO was to get into the left rear seat. Since I was on duty as Assistant Officer of the Watch (AOOW), he asked me find out what that Midshipman was doing there. My query revealed that the Midshipman was occupying the CO Sindhudurg end of the Staff Car as instructed by his CO. After that, I learnt that our CO started sharing the car with the other two.

In the Navy, you can be CO of an Aircraft Carrier or of the latest Stealth Frigate. But, as far as civilians are concerned, your proud existence is like the opening line of a song: Jungle mein more naacha, kisane dekha? (A peacock dancing in the Jungle is unseen). Your true pride comes in when you sit in a staff-car, wherein neither the car nor the driver pack-up when you require it most.

I retired from the Navy in 2010. I do not know if the situation has changed now.

The Three Things that I would like to change, if I were to join armed forces again are:

1. Bureaucratic Red-Tapism.

2. Cronyism.

3. Hyper Protocol Consciousness.

In this Part I, I shall deal with BRT or Babugiri. On commissioning of a ship, we hoist, on the main mast, a pennant or pendant called the Commissioning Pennant or Pendant. When the ship is decommissioned, it hoists a Decommissioning Pennant whose length is proportional to the number of years of service the ship has done. I wish, at the time of decommissioning, they’d hoist the Bureaucratic Red-Tape too that the ship had to suffer. This goes on becoming longer and longer with every year spent in service. On second thought, I think the only reason the BRT is not hoisted at decommissioning of a ship is because it doesn’t cease there. Like Tennyson’s Brook, it goes on forever.

Here is an anecdote I remember. I was Commander Work-up in Warship Work-up Organisation in Vizag. During those days WWO wasn’t an independent entity under FOST but was considered as an appendage to the Fleet Staff. Hence, I was privileged to attend meetings of Commanding Officers chaired by the Fleet Commander. Commander NS Rawat (Chhotu Rawat) joined the Eastern Fleet as CO of the newly commissioned corvette INS Khanjar. For one of these meets he had given an agenda point that the number of written records and returns that a ship had to render was abnormally high. This not only kept the ship’s staff from attending to their operational tasks but also, small ships like corvettes had very limited secretarial staff and with just one Writer (a navy term for secretarial staff) on board it was well-nigh impossible to produce the plethora of records and returns on every conceivable subject.

This point, like all points for which the authorities don’t have ready answers to, was hotly debated for the next one hour. Highly sharp naval operational minds churned the grey matter from one side of the brain to the other and lo and behold they had the solution ready. Rawat was told to send an analysis in four parts: Part I containing those Returns and Records that were considered necessary; Part II containing those Returns and Records that could be done away with; Part III containing those Returns and Records that, with little modification, could be subsumed in Part I; and finally Part IV containing those Records and Returns that didn’t exist earlier but had now become necessary. “And” the Fleet Commander added with satisfaction at having dexterously solved a complex problem, “You better send this in sextuplicate so that five Fleet Staff officers can simultaneously peruse the document and arrive at a quick decision.”

I looked at Chhotu Rawat’s face. Very soon he’d had enough and he left the Navy. That class of ships were given to the Navy’s most outstanding officers to command and he was the commissioning CO at that. Here is another real tale from HQ ENC (no marks to me for creativity and innovation) In a Half Yearly Command Staff Meeting, I, as Director of Tactical Trainer in Vizag gave an agenda point that ships and units were always on the receiving end of Bureaucratic Red-Tapism and that NMS (New Management System that gave financial powers to officers at various hierarchical levels) had virtually failed. NMS was the Navy’s effort to take over Management of its own finances from the bureaucrats in the government. My point was that NMS only replaced one set of bureaucrats with another. First of all, it required guts (on my part) to give this as an agenda point. The staff officers at HQENC by-passed it but it was selected by C-in-C personally. The decision given was that if an issue/sanction was given within one month it would be referred to as a Green issue (parallel to Green Customs channel at the airports). However, if it was more than three months old, it would be referred to as Red issue. For the in-between period, it would be called an Amber issue. Did this cut down BRT and increase efficiency? You betcha! A few months later, I received an urgent letter from HQENC to this effect: “Your Return of Red, Amber, Green issues at HQENC for the month of March 1998 still awaited. Request expedite”.

Armed forces all over the world detest bureaucracy. However, there is nothing like a bureaucrat in white uniform. Outwardly, he/she would like us to believe that that he/she wants to put great distances between he/she and babus; but, some of them behave worse than babus “just to be on safe side”. Many such white uniformed babus become sticklers to regulations and rules and they know every rule in the world that can deny you what you have asked for. Many a times, you may not have asked for anything to improve quality of life; but, indeed, in your estimate it would be an operational and critical requirement. Its criticality and operational emergency, however, starts resting as soon as it reaches the sanctioning or recommending authority.

The highest forum in which such things are discussed is the Quarterly Command Staff Meeting wherein the C-in-C is face to face with all operational heads and Commanding Officers. In babugiri there is no other meeting that beats its approach. For a point to come up in the QCM, it would have started at the ship’s level about three to six months in advance. After that the concerned staff officer at HQ would have selected only that point for which he has some sort of answer. Once, CO of a Missile Boat in Mumbai put up a point that unlike big ships, Missile Boats don’t have any transport given to them (their COs are too junior (LtCdr only) to deserve transport. However, in harbour, many times they have to take their machinery parts, pumps and motors to dockyard centres for repairs. Hence, could the dockyard lighter be requisitioned by them to facilitate this?

The entire Command staff had (serious and well-thought of) views on this. CO of MB was asked such highly pertinent questions as to how many times in the last two years did he actually require such lighter? The poor chap didn’t have this data. He kept saying “very often” but, the Command staff desired exact number to be able to take (intelligent) decision. Finally, the decision given was, “CSO (P&A) to study the problem together with ND (MB) and come up with recommendations in the next QCM.

The CO of missile boat must have been thrilled that his ship would start receiving the services of the dockyard lighter before the next general elections or the next five-year plan.

If a defect occurs on a ship which affects its operational role, it has to report this defect as OPDEF (Operational Defect). This procedure was started a few decades back so that adequate pressure could be brought on the shore authorities to urgently attend to such defects, either in the Fleet Maintenance Unit or in the Naval Dockyard. However, this opened a Pandora’s box. In the morning meetings, C-in-C would keep on seeing such OPDEFs but after days and weeks nothing done. So, the smarter ships’ COs found a smart way out to get over CinC seeing these on regular basis and thereby earning the wrath of Command staff officers. They simply would negotiate with HQ and Dockyard so that such OPDEFs wherein nothing could be done weren’t reported. With this curious shortcut, if a ship had to be sailed on an operational mission, the CSO (Ops) or COO would frantically start phoning ships to find their real status. Eventually, they came up with a new term (bureaucrats or babus are good at devising great sounding new terms). Hold your breath; this new term is called STA or Ship Tied Alongside or in other word: By-God-OPDEF. However, soon people found newer means to cheat on this too.

I have given you BRT only in operational matters so far. Can you imagine the BRT in administrative and Logistic matters? Smart COs, through their “excellent liaison and inter personal relations” manage to get the moon for their ships. Others become good at writing letters and replies and have a great future as blog writers after leaving the Navy.

What about the gargantuan bureaucratic organisation that we have in the Navy called the Controller of Defence Accounts? Once again, I am steering clear from babugiri in our own transfer and temporary duty claims and I am giving you one of the several operational examples that I have.

In the year 1995-6, after my tenure as Commander Viraat, I was appointed to Viraat Project Team to oversee the Short Refit of Viraat at CSL, Kochi. We, in VPT were very conscious of the need for Viraat to complete its SR in time. For this we had to run around making PERT charts, critical paths, alternates and so on. One of the items of SR was the overhauling of one of the three Turbo Alternators. Whereas for most of the other overhauls, spares were to be contracted by the Yard, ie, CSL; for the TAs, the spares were to be ‘Navy Supply’. Navy was to contract some of these from the Pune based firm Alfa Laval. They refused to ship these to Kochi until, as per the contract, they would receive 90 percent of the payment post factory inspection. The ball lay in CDA (Navy)’s court. I spoke to the concerned Account Officers at CDA and then made a Fax to Alfa Laval: HAVE SPOKEN TO CDA. THEY PROMISES TO RELEASE PAYMENTS. KINDLY SHIP THE VALVES AT MY ASSURANCE.

Next day, I received the following Fax from them, “GRATEFUL TO YOU FOR YOUR PROMISE. IT IS FOR YOUR INFORMATION THAT DESPITE SIMILAR PROMISES IN THE PAST, PAYMENTS NOT RECEIVED FOR OUR FOLLOWING BILLS”. This list ran into two pages of Bills of the past four years.

Before I finish, I want to give you three good examples too; two of my own and one of Commander Ponappa (a Logistic Officer who was different). I discontinued most ship’s returns and records when I took over as Flotilla Commander in Vizag. I encouraged Commanding Officers (in numbers, I had more ships under me than the Fleet Commander) to report things only by exception; otherwise, I would take for granted that everything was ops. In Vizag, as Command Communication Officer I authorised all officers to book calls on Naval Trunks when I found out that the usability and efficiency of leased telephone lines from P&T were merely 20 to 30 percent. Commander Ponappa became SLOGO in HQWNC. He had set up for himself personal standards for according sanctions. Once I went to him to get a sanction for I&M (Incidental and Miscellaneous) Grant. I handed over an advance copy of our request to him and told him formal copy would arrive by mail. He took action on that itself and by the time I left his office, he handed over the typed and signed sanction to me.

For the most of the Navy, such examples are very rare. Enormous time and energy is dissipated on such babugiri. People are given awards and honours depending upon how fast they have been able to get sanctions and approvals on “personal liaison and inter personal relations”. Yet, ask any Navy officer; he lets you know that he hates BRT or babugiri and that it is this babugiri that has kept our country from becoming a great power. However, the truth is that as soon as he reaches a position of authority, he is as bad, if not more, as a babu on the civvie street.

This is first of the three things that I would like to change if I were to join armed forces again. The other two follow.