From NDC I moved to Betwa in January ’67. For the first and only time, NHQ personnel branch offered me a choice of ships - Brahmaputra or Betwa. The attraction of the former was that it was slated to go to Montreal for EXPO ‘67 but since it was the senior ship of the 16th Frigate Squadron, it had specialists heading all departments and I would at best be someone’s deputy. Betwa, equipped with the latest Gun Direction system of that time, the FPS5, had only Gunnery headed by a specialist officer in Lt HKL Sachar. So I opted for Betwa hoping I would be the Signal Communications Officer (SCO) and gain some experience before going for my Long C course. Meanwhile, my friend and NDA coursemate, Suresh ‘Bobby’ Bhandoola, who too had been selected for the Long C course, also got appointed to Betwa. Bobby and I reported on board together wondering which one of us would be given the job of SCO by the Captain of the ship, Cdr RH Tahiliani. We hadn’t reckoned how smart the Captain was- he allotted TAS (Torpedo and Anti-submarine) to Bobby and Navigation to me! SCO went to young Sub Lt Vijay Shivdasani on his first appointment after earning the Watchkeeping certificate. Incidentally, he was also selected for Long C a few years down the line!
I was happy though as navigating the ship under an intelligent and competent Captain was a rich and rewarding experience which stood me in good stead for my own command of ships later. Simple pieces of advice, like when entering the not too well-marked Okha channel with only a lone starboard-hand buoy to guide, Cdr Tahiliani asked me to go close to the buoy rather than the centre of the channel because he said, “Always safer to go close to a known danger”.
Betwa was fully operational and we spent a lot of time sailing independently and as part of the Indian Fleet. We generally performed well and I recall just one incident when we could have been in trouble. We entered Cochin harbor and were trying to secure head and stern to buoys but foul monsoon weather, unfavourable tidal conditions and strong winds prevented us from doing so despite repeated attempts. Finally tugs were called to help secure the ship. We feared we had gone over the buoys and might have damaged our propellers and reported the incident to higher authorities. Thereafter we sent divers to examine the propellers and were relieved to find they were undamaged. As the incident had been reported, a board of inquiry was appointed which too cleared the ship of any damage and the Captain and Navigating Officer of any blame.
A constant source of concern was our gyro compass which often went ‘hunting’ and was unreliable. During a fleet exercise, the Captain told the yeoman on duty to make a signal to the fleet commander (FOCIF), “My gyro erratic”. Something went wrong between transmission and reception of the signal as during the debrief of the exercises, FOCIF, Rear Adm SM Nanda, asked Cdr Tahiliani to give details of the gyro that could go “erotic”. This remained Cdr Tahiliani’s one and only favourite story which I heard him recount dozens of times as he progressed from Commander to Admiral!
Our wardroom was lively and fun. Apart from Bobby Bhandoola, we had another coursemate, Virendra ‘Magoo’ Nehra who was the Supply Officer. Lt Sachar, ‘Guns’ as he was known, had a good sense of humour and kept us in high spirits. In our free time we used to play a game called ‘Liar Dice’ which was a shortened version of poker played with two dice instead of cards. The loser had to pay a penalty and a favourite one after a few drinks was to ask him to jump out of the porthole. Nobody actually could but the efforts were great to earn a riot of laughs!
With Magoo Nehra fond of western pop, music was the other pastime. Apart from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones were hitting the top of pop charts and my favourite number which I used to listen to and sing was “I can get no satisfaction” with Bobby Bhandoola always showing mock sympathy and asking me why!
The Long C course was finally scheduled for September ’67 and my Betwa spell came to an end after just 8 months.
Loved it, as usual. BTW, was Bobby Bandoola's wife called Janaki?
ReplyDeleteYes. You are coming up as Rta. Would love if you identify yourself.
DeleteLove the story about the erotic gyro. Could relate to this poor captain and his one and only favourite story and his re-telling it all the way up the ladder. Wasn’t a bad one to re-tell, though, except to the poor souls who happened to be around in subsequent re-tells.
ReplyDeleteAs always, the mention of music in your stories catches my attention. I well remember ‘I can get no…satisfaction’ being played at the time in the then just arrived discos of Delhi. And the mention of names reminds me of people related. Thank you!