Indian Navy chief quits after submarine fire incident

New Delhi: In a day of dramatic developments, Navy Chief Admiral D.K. Joshi resigned on Wednesday after the accident on the INS Sindhuratna submarine that left seven sailors unconscious and two officers missing taking “moral responsibility” for the spate of accidents and incidents that have rocked the Indian Navy in the past seven months. The resignation cut short his three year tenure as chief. The Centre, unhappy with Admiral Joshi’s record as chief, accepted the resignation in the evening after Defence Minister A.K. Antony met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The decision triggered intense speculation that the government may have asked Admiral Joshi to step down but defence sources claimed that that was not the case.

Navy vice-chief, Vice Admiral R.K. Dhowan, has been asked to officiate as chief pending the appointment of a regular Navy Chief. This is the first time in independent India’s history that a service chief has resigned and the second time a naval chief’s tenure has been abruptly cut short. In 1998, then Navy Chief Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat was sacked by the NDA government According to some reports, Mr Antony also apprised President Pranab Mukherjee about the incident on the INS Sindhuratna on Wednesday. In the latest of a series of incidents involving naval vessels, two naval officers went missing and seven other sailors became unconscious after smoke filled the third compartment of the submarine when it was 100 km from the Mumbai coast. A fire is said to have broken out in the compartment causing emission of the dense smoke. The 25 year old submarine, acquired from Russia in the 1980s, was undergoing sea trials underwater on Wednesday after a refit that ended in December 2013, when the incident occurred at around 6 am. There were no weapons on board at that time, sources said.