Tribute to Admiral Jayant Nadkarni (Former Chief of Naval Staff (Indian Navy) 1987-1990)

(My tribute to Admiral Nadkarni on his demise. Dated 22 July 2018 at Pune, Maharashtra, India)

President Navy Foundation Pune, Members of the Pune chapter, the very special Golf four- ball who ensured that Adm.. Nadkarni played as long as he could, Ladies and Gentlemen.

It would be puerile on my part to summarize the naval career of Adm. Nadkarni. I know that a number of you have served under him, perhaps none here has been his peer and surely no one senior to him is present in this audience.

Exactly a year ago I paid tribute to a hero of the attack on Karachi and I began with what Gen Patton had said; "It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather, we should thank God that such men lived".

Adm. Nadkarni certainly belongs to that category which exhorts or commends us to Thank God that he lived and that his inherent intellect guided the navy during a very difficult phase of our growth. 1987 to 1990 saw many ups and downs in our economy and the defence budget took a beating.

Yet during his watch much was achieved and those are listed on the internet. You don’t need me to elucidate those records. What I shall do today is to tell you a few stories that have perhaps never been told before. Let me at the outset state that I came to know more about him after I retired than while in service. After all, post retirement activities are truly reflective of one’s ability to contribute to the society as a whole. Apart from being the founding member of CAAS, IMF and the Patron of MHS which he handed over to me, he was also sought after by Academics and had even contributed to the print media with some incisive articles on affairs Maritime.

That he was least flamboyant, unflappable and extremely observant is known to many. Allow me to present a couple of anecdotes, which I believe have not been recorded. But before that, this is what Adm. Awati said within hours of Adm. Nadkarni’s departure. “Podgy was an accomplished navigator who had a special touch for the Haven-Finding art which I do not see since his days at sea in a ship or as the Commander of the Western Fleet. I hope my readers understand the point I have made in describing this officer in his heyday. I experienced it first-hand. None, to my knowledge, has matched him in the past fifty years or more. The quiet, self-effacing facade hid a steely determination to do right, always and every time, by his ships and men. He belongs to that immensely rare breed of men who display character. It was forged during his difficult teens and early adulthood when he had to struggle against adverse conditions at home, facing denials.” Having been the navigator of INS Delhi, he knew that ship pretty well. He made a name for himself and that has been recorded in the history of the navy titled ‘Blue print to Blue water’. When INS Delhi, which was under long refit had to be pulled out in 1961 for gun fire support to the Army off Diu, Capt. Krishnan (later Vice Admiral and C-in-C East during the 1971 conflict) asked that his old crew and especially Podgy as the navigator should be brought back on board. The rest is history.   And so years later while in command of INS Delhi which lay at anchor at Port Blair flying the Flag of the then C-in-C East, he remained confident and unflappable.  When the Capt. was told by the Admiral that he should leave harbour in total darkness, he promptly saw the opportunity to go fishing during the remaining day light hours- with two of his ship mates. The Capt. returned on board 15 minutes prior to weighing anchor and was on the bridge wings conning the ship out of Port Blair while casually chatting with his ship mates on the successful fishing expedition. This left the C-in-C speechless and rather neglected, perhaps.

The second anecdote is when he visited Moscow in the then powerful Soviet Union, He was to deliver a pre-dinner speech. The problem was that the carefully crafted and politically correct speech prepared by his NA and the Naval Attache was left behind at the Hotel. The Admiral had merely glanced at it. When he was invited to speak and realised that the papers were not quite there, he merely waived his hand and whispered to the NA that he had glanced at the points and that was enough. He was not a great orator and yet managed to convey his message effectively.

Of the many other stories, here is a true story narrated by Prof Gautam Sen who lives in Pune. “In 1993, Podgy took her (Mrs Nadkarni} on a holiday to Europe. He was my house guest in Florence for seven days where I was a Jean Monnet Fellow at the European University Institute. She had already lost more than 60% of her vision. Every single day he would take her around Florence and give a continuous commentary explaining everything that came in the line of sight. But the most astounding thing was when he took her to the Da Vinci Museum and explained every Michael Angelo sculpture/ painting for nearly six hours. If you closed your eyes and only heard the voice of Podgy each item came to life. And there she was holding his arm listening and asking questions. Even some of the visitors trailed behind the two to listen to Podgy’s narration - an unusual display of his knowledge about art and architecture of the renaissance period to perfection. Not many may have known his deep understanding, study and appreciation of European history, its legacy of culture and the role of the Catholic Church. But what stood out was his devotion to her to ensure that she saw through his eyes exactly as you and I would see and remember Europe.” To bring him back to life today, I shall play a short extract of his interview that I recorded in March 2016, for the book on Ronnie Pereira. He was a great admirer of Adm. Pereira. He was the COS in quick succession to three legendary Admirals of our Navy. Adm. Pereira, Adm. Rusi Gandhi and Adm. Barboza. This is what he said to me.

Click to hear Adm. Nadkarni speaking about Adm. R.L Pereira

Let me conclude this chapter with the one I have chosen from a plethora of anecdotes narrated to me during the last week when I contacted a number of officers who had served under him. His NA who is not keeping too well narrated this one. Just prior to his retirement Adm. Nadkarni noticed that the navy had begun to pursue a new penchant for pre- retirement activities. Traditional activities such as wining out, dining out and pulling out had expanded to Golfing out, in some cases ‘tennising out’ and riding out too. Hence, he enquired with tongue in cheek whether he could be ‘Kabbadeed’ out as that was the only sport suitable for his podginess.

I gave a lot of thought to how I can conclude this tribute to Adm. Nadkarni. I think he would be delighted if we gave him a theen jai. Ladies and Gentlemen please rise- “THEEN JAI KE LIYE THAYYAR-ADM NADKARNI KI - JAI…….”