My Speech on the occasion of immersion of ashes of Cdr BN Kavina Vrc on 24 July 2017
I stand
before you as a member of the prestigious Killers Family which has been in
existence since the attack on Karachi during the 1971 hostilities with
Pakistan. We have now lost another of the few remaining decorated sailors of
the original Killer squadron, who lived to tell a tale. A tale of dedication,
bonding ,camaraderie and professional competence.
Undoubtedly that level of bonding and loyalty
to the squadron would not have been
achieved without the difficult conditions under which we were trained in a remote
part of Vladivostok, that too on an island in 1969/70. Sequestered as we were
with no liberty to leave the island except for a few hours on weekends, the
secret nature of the city itself and
given the extreme temperatures of -32 C in winter, we learnt to survive together.
Survival under harsh conditions, as the Army would tell us, bonds people like
no other activity in ones life.
Letters from home took more than a month to
reach us via the embassy. Married
officers and sailors had no means to contact their families since telephones
were rare to find and the cost of a call unaffordable. That is where we became
comrades in arms. We learnt to eat what was served, live with scanty winter
clothes and celebrate any occasion that would keep us happy. Thus living
together and sharing common spaces and
joint activities helped us to bridge wide gaps in seniority. It also enabled us to assess
each other's strengths and weaknesses. The entire contingent at Vladivostok
learned to trust each other. The fact that we were poised for combat operations
further cemented our camaraderie.
LtCdr
Bahadur Nariman Kavina was one of the
handpicked Commanding officers among the eight. I was the XO of the eighth boat
, later to be named INS Veer. Our association commenced in 1969 and continued
to grow even after his premature retirement in 1981.
As I now
gather from Mrs Kavina , Farida, to us, just a day prior to his passing away, he
enquired about the health of my wife Gita who is recovering from a surgery.
That tells you how our association went well beyond retirement and even death
as some would say.
Much has
been said and written about the Killers. Let us not forget that Cdr Kavina was
later the Commissioning Commanding officer of INS Hosdurg a Missile Corvette. Capt,
then Lt Prabhakar (Pubs)recalls that the Commanding Officer managed to maintain
a smiling face and that he never saw him angry throughout the 28 months he
served under him. However Cdr Kavina was known to be firm when required. One
such example was when he refused to accept Hosdurg from the Russians as one of her engines was
sub optimal in performance . No amount of pressure from Delhi and Moscow would
make him relent until the engine was changed.
Earlier when
the Commissioning crew was being mustered at Mumbai and was preparing to
complete departure formalities, Pubs had to face a dilemma. His wedding had
been fixed during the pre departure preparation. Torn between the desire to
commission a new powerful unit and his impending wedding, he apologetically
broke the news to his Captain. To his utter surprise his CO said, "Pubs
don't worry. Your wedding is more important in your life. Proceed on leave
forthwith ." Pubs left two weeks before the wedding date with orders to
return a week after his wedding.
Pubs goes on
to add, when the ship was returning to India, soon after crossing the Suez
canal, he was summoned to report to Captain's cabin. It was there that Pubs was
told that his father at Bengaluru was very serious and that arrangements had
been made for disembarking him at Aden from where he would fly back to India
via Cairo. Capt Prabhakar declares that he practised what he learnt from Cdr Kavina
during his command of Dunagiri. That is a great tribute to Cdr Kavina.
The 22 missile vessel squadron has from time
to time invited us to partake in the annual Killers day celebrations during the
navy week . Fortunately, many of us had gathered here in 2015 and that was the
last speech delivered by Cdr Kavina to the Killer squadron. He was later given
the opportunity to be present at the decommissioning ceremony of INS Nipat as he was in Command of the original Nipat.
Coming now
to the event today, I recall two quotes of General Patton during the second
world war. "It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather, we
should thank God that such men lived"
unquote. It is the same General who had earlier said, " It is not your
duty to die for your country. Your job is to make the other poor dumb bastard
die for his country. "
The Killer squadron did just that. In both operations Trident and Python, we
lost not a single ship or sailor. The enemy
lost ships and sailors and Karachi was left burning.
Bahadur
Kavina who later became a guide and guardian to both my wife and me, with whole
hearted support of Farida, has shared every joyous occasion in our lives and
equally our sorrows too. Young Carl and his sister Roshni gave us great
pleasure of babysitting them at Kochi in
1972.
On a solemn occasion like this when the serving community has joined us
to complete the formalities of Cdr Kavina's
last journey, I must clarify that ceremonial funerals and their
procedures are laid down in our orders. Immersion of ashes is however left to
the family as a private affair. In this case an exception has been made since
he died in Australia during his annual visit to his children and grand
children. That the navy accepted my suggestion to immerse his ashes from a
Missile boat, speaks well of their credo, "We care."
To the
serving community I have two messages. First, let me restate what George Washington said a long time ago."
The willingness with which young people are likely to serve in any war no
matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive the
veterans of earlier wars were treated and appreciated by the nation."
To which I
will add that until our nation as a whole learns to do that, let us, both, the serving
and retired community, honour our heroes to the best of our abilities. The
presence of men in uniform at functions such as these, is vitally important for
morale of the fighting forces. The larger the gathering the more forceful will
be our message that we care.
"Although
no sculptured marble should rise to
their memory, nor engraved stones bear records of their deeds ,yet will their
remembrance be as lasting as the land they honoured"
Second, what is it that kept relations between my
generation and Cdr Kavina's going for so
long, defying time and space.?
It is, I
believe, as I quoted Gen Pershing on another occasion recently, " In a social order in which one person is officially subordinate to
another, the superior if he is a Gentleman never thinks of it and the
subordinate if he is a Gentleman never
forgets it." Most such long lasting relationships of mutual trust
and faith in each other's intentions have perhaps followed that adage or
aphorism.
Let us rise and give Cdr Kavina the most
befitting "Teen Jai".
