Subhashis Mittra
Efforts to enhance India’s status as a regional naval power might face a choppy sea as the force is failing to preserve even those of its vessels than are still seaworthy, leave alone the rapid expansion and modernisation programme envisioned in the face of concerns about China’s naval ambitions.
Six months after a massive explosion sank a submarine, Sindhurakshak, a fire inside another, Sinduratna, and the resignation of navy chief Admiral D K Joshi are a grim reminder that all is far from well with the Indian Navy.
Joshi’s prompt resignation, owning moral responsibility, is praiseworthy. But 12 mishaps involving conventional submarines and warships in a span of seven months could potentially cripple the Navy’s operational capabilities, say defence experts.
This may also severely impair India’s ambitions of becoming a strategic blue-water power able to operate far beyond its extensive coastline, they fear.
Analysts feel the only way to scale up the safety aspect is by hiking the Navy’s capital outlay, which was a little less than Rs 25,000 crore in 2013-14. Though the Navy spends about 65% of this on new equipment, the number can be increased.
The accident involving two deaths on the Indian Navy’s submarine INS Sindhuratna has triggered several debates concerning the country’s defence forces. The most prominent one is the level of safety that should be accorded to the defence personnel.
The damage to Sindhuratna, caused by a fire in the submarine’s battery kit, is one in a series of frightful episodes which point to a troubling question: how well is the Navy, which seeks to play a dominant role in the Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal, equipped to maintain its assets during peacetime? Not very well, as the number of maritime mishaps and subsequent lack of corrective action indicate.
The job of moving a submarine towards its enemy counterpart is done by giant batteries, which ironically, can be lethal for people on board because when a battery is charged, it releases hydrogen, which is inflammable.
This has been broadly the case with the INS Sindhurakshak, which incidentally had undergone a Rs 815 crore upgrade in Russia, and the INS Sindhuratna. The huge cost of the upgrade becomes at once questionable when naval officers themselves said it had something to do with the tragedy.
Sindhurakshak, Sindhuratna and Siudhugosh (which ran aground in January because of high level of silt near the harbour) are Russian Kilo-class submarines that were t form the backbone of India’s conventional submarin force.
More than half of submarines have completed 75% of their operational lives. Five of India’s 13 submarines are past their prime because they were bought in the 1980s, when it was profitable to do such deals with the erstwhile USSR.
Long before Sindhurakshsk went out of action, only six of India’s 14 submarines Were operating at any given time. Effectively, very few guard the coastline. The navy’s plans to build, with French assistance, a new class of conventional submarines called Scropene have been delayed.
Another issue is the country’s dependence on imports for its purchases of arms and battleships.
To make better use of the defence budget and the allocation for capital expenditure, stepping up the level of indigenisation is of utmost importance, as Defence Minister A K Antony has himself said. Though the Navy scores better than the Army on this count, it leaves much to be desired. For many components such as engines and propulsion systems, India’s four defence shipyards have to look abroad. Submarine Sindhurakshak met an accident Aug 14, 2013, when blasts ripped thorough the boat killing three officers and 15 sailors. The submarine was berthed in Mumbai harbour. Submarine Sindhuratna met with an accident Feb 26 when a fire onboard resulted in the death of two sailors while seven members of the 94-strong crew had to be evacuated after they inhaled smoke. A board of inquiry, in its preliminary report, said a fire in some cables I d to the smoke in the third compartment.
“The last two accidents -accident on INS Kolkata and the one on the Arihant class submarine- have nothing to do with the Navy. There is no magic for stopping accidents. There will be human or mechanical errors. But yes, the series of accidents in unfortunate,” says former chief of the Indian Navy Arun Prakash. An accident resulted in the death of a civilian worker when a tank lid fell on the workers a pressure of the hydraulic tank of the Aribant class submarine was being tested in Vizag. Earlier, an officer was killed and a worker injured after inhaling carbon dioxide gas which leaked from a container on an advanced warship, INS Kolkata, being outfitted at a dock in Mumbai.
Of the 10 accidents cited two, involving loss of life on board submarines, are indeed grave and warrant a thorough probe. The remaining eight were of a trivial nature-collisions, groundings and minor fire – that happen frequently in all active seagoing navies. With no common thread running through them, it was just an unfortunate happenstance that they occurred in rapid succession.
New or old, no Indian Navy warship sails out unless it meets stringent safety and seaworthiness requirements, but accidents will happen at sea. Navies that have zero accidents are the ones that stay put in harbour.
“However, our Soviet -era vessels are quite old, and the accidents on two kilo-class submarines call into question, not only Russian workmanship, but also our own operating and maintenance procedures,” says the former Navy chief. Since 2008, the Navy’s operational tempo has mounted steadily on account of overseas deployments, anti-piracy patrols, tactical exercises and coastal security commitments. If this has brought excessive strain on personnel as well as ships and machinery, something is bound to give. It is the responsibility of naval commanders to ensure that commitments remain commensurate with resource and unwarranted pressures are not imposed on men and machine, nor are any safety norms violated.
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