BLOG 15 - I COMPLETE THE COURSE IN AUGUST 1970 AND LEAVE DMET TO START A CAREER AT SEA

In two of the previous blogs, I had mentioned the names of batch mates who were close to me. There were also a few seniors whose names I would like to mention, as amongst those who had a lot of influence on me in a very positive way.

There was MK Dutta, 2 years senior to me and my first Cadet Captain, now in the UK (?), who held senior positions in UK Marine Department, who I have not been able to contact.

There were those who were one year senior to me, Amit Ray (of the "Are you showing me your red eye?" fame), who later became a valued and highly reputed academician in Singapore.

The quiet RN Chadha who rose to a very senior position in a top Classification Society.

The highly competent and intelligent P Mitter. I cannot ever forget his answering one boiler question by drawing a complete 3D picture of internals of a Scotch boiler, showing the route to be taken to maximise a thorough inspection or survey of the boiler. Brilliance at its best. It is my misfortune that I lost contact with him.

At the time of leaving a home, an institution or a place, one does not realise the depth of impact they have had on one's personality, habits, thoughts and behaviour. The realisation dawns over a couple of decades, as one matures and starts to face the realities that life has to offer. DMET is one such institution that moulds you for life, mostly in a positive way. The sins of commission and omission are, then, entirely yours.

Institutional traditions play either a bigger part or a smaller part in one's lives, depending upon how each person has responded to the institutional stimuli. An example is the unarticulated bonding between different generations of cadets who have passed out of the institution and bearing the same last two digits in their roll numbers, such as 1165 and 4465. These days it has been taken up by a notch, with similar last three digits, such as 1165 and 5165.

Due to the present situation (2022) in which around 3000 cadets pass out of marine institutes, there is a logjam as far as entry level jobs are concerned, as only about a 1000 are able to procure jobs. In the last couple of years. I have been approached by two such unemployed boys for assistance, merely because they were 5000 odd and 6000 odd roll numbers after mine, with matching last two numbers. I did the best I could.

The camaraderie between quite a few batch mates remains undiminished, even after several decades, even as we approach dotage, qualify for the benefits accrued to Senior Citizens and are, sometimes, sent into 'Geriatrics Ward' in a hospital.

Seniors continue to be respected. One is expected to help a down-and-out colleague.

Chapter 11

During the Puja holidays of my 2nd year, I had to go to Madras, as Dad had been transferred to Madras from Secunderabad. The Armed Forces do themselves well in many aspects. For example, the last posting prior retirement (for the more senior officers) can be to a station of their choice. The obvious intention is to allow them to stabilise themselves – buy a plot of land, build a house, educate their children in good colleges etc. So, Madras it was.

I was not at all familiar with Madras, having visited the city only briefly at various stages of my life, as it were. The address was a rented upstairs portion of a house in North Usman Road, TNagar. But the street was packed with people, especially in front of one bungalow, right early in the morning. My family resided bang opposite this particular bungalow. Snaking my way around the crowd, I went upstairs to my family.

My sister told me that the crowd had come from Andhra – they had all obviously been to Tirupathi, as their heads were all shaven – to pay homage to an actress who lived in that bungalow. Why? Because she plays the roles of goddesses in many Telugu movies. So, she comes out onto her first floor balcony, clad in her nightgown and gives them her blessings. On the one hand, I was thunderstruck at the stupidity of her devotees. But, on the other hand, I was wonderstruck at her charm and beauty. I was already a fan of hers.. This was the actress Rajshri. I saw many of her movies later in life, which continues to this day.

I also made some very close friends during my Final Year, from among those who had come from Bombay. Among them:

Thomas K Varghese (the ‘K’ standing for Kottakuzhial):

Another life long friend that I got to know in my Fourth year. He was in my Sadan and a couple of doors away. Another of my teachers, along with AK Sharma, who helped me get through the more difficult subjects in my Fourth year. Very casually brilliant. In my reckoning, he should have been a close front runner for the President’s Gold Medal. But he eschewed the process of getting it, by not sucking up to the Officers / Lecturers that matter in the establishment and leaving the regional politics that went with being awarded a prize. Whenever I got stuck when I was studying, I used to pop down to his cabin and he used to patiently explain from the fundamentals onwards. I owe him a lot.

What a footballer! My erstwhile Bengali colleagues all prided themselves on their football skills, but Tommy was in a zone of his own. As a full back, nothing got past him. I will never forget, and always admire, his challenging the opponent, taking the ball away from him and sending it deep into the opponent’s territory, into the feet of a waiting teammate. I was only a spectator to a show of lost excellence.

Without him in my life, the job with Barber Ship Management would not have been offered. A string of coincidences led to this, which I will relate later.

With him settling down in Chennai, our friendship was cemented for eternity. He and Shanti (his wife), along with son Praveen, hosted us numerous times, always with warmth and affection.

R. Manohar Kumar (Mannu to us):

Soft spoken, very quiet and unassuming, very intelligent and strong. Years before six packs were the vogue, he was the perfect example of a V-shaped body. When I used to tease him, he would - smilingly - pick me up in one hand and put me down. Our paths crossed several times in later years.

Phiroze R Patel:

Something strange happened during the first few days of my Fourth year. We had shifted from Junior Hostel to Senior Hostel and all my Bombay colleagues had also reached the hostel. We had a rather large dining hall, with ten long tables. If one were to be sitting on one side of the table, you can see most of the others at other tables, if one were facing them.

On the third or the fourth day, I happened to be a little late for breakfast and so was another (Bombayite) at another table. Looking at him, some old memory stirred and I pondered over it for a few minutes, till I went over to his table and asked him “Aren’t you Phiroze Patel?”.

He said “Yes”.

“Don’t you want to know how I know your name, not having met you before?”

He said “Ah, you could have found out my name from one of the other Bombayites and are now pulling my leg”.

I told him “Your class teacher in VI Standard was Mrs. Wintle”.

His jaw dropped and he said ‘How did you know?’

His brother and I had been classmates in St. Joseph’s College, Coonoor till VI Standard, before I left to study in Stanes, Coimbatore.

I was meeting him after (more or less) 11 years and I had recognized him. We became lifelong friends from that moment. He also came to live in Chennai for many years, during which time we came closer to each other.

There were others I came to know pretty well in later years –

Auldius Paulus Boniface Pais (APB Pais) –

We both made our names in South India Shipping Corporation and we also sailed on the same ship for a short while. He, also, later, joined Barber Ship Management and was their Chief Engineer for a long, long time. After he turned 60, he was snubbed by Barber’s and joined Anglo Eastern till he retired around 70 years of age.

Gittoo Kapoor – as versatile and as intelligent as they come, warm hearted, an aptitude for songs in different languages and a good friend. I think he was the tallest in our batch and a deep booming voice to match. I can never forget his family’s (wife, son, daughter) hospitality when I stayed with them for a few days, the warmth of a Punjabi family. Another unforgettable incident took place in later years.

His office work used to take him to different corners of India. After one such visit into the deep south, he came to our home in Chennai and excitedly told us " I have seen your 'Abirami'". He was talking about a very revered temple in the deep south, where the female deity's name is 'Abirami' and where couples go to pray when the husband reaches 60 years of age.

Seshaji Sirius Ratnakumar Wayte (SSR Wayte): I came to know him in my Fourth Year more because we both spoke Tamil slang (as spoken in Madras). In later years, we sailed together in SISCO.

He continued in SISCO and took up a shore job in Madras itself. Later he became a much valued and respected lecturer in Marine subjects.

B Saxena: Tied together by a love for hockey – of which he was a great proponent, his dribbling skills were fantastic – we became close later on in life. Such a lovely family. Later, in the 1990s, on my wife’s insistence, we shifted from Chennai to Mumbai, bought a flat in Nerul and tried to get my sons admitted into a nearby school offering the CBSE stream. Saxena gave us tremendous support, especially in using his influence to obtain school admissions, which were hard to come by. The shift was short lived for other reasons and we returned to Chennai 6 months later. Saxena’s wife and daughter were founts of affection during those months and in later years.

Vishnu Saili: I came to know him better quite a few years after he settled down in Singapore, during which time I also visited Singapore quite a few times. A friend you can turn to when in trouble,

My anecdotes of my DMET days will not be complete without some of the cultural activities in which I played a big part.

Quiz Competitions: This was an annual affair, with 4 members of each batch in 4 teams, competing against each other. For the first three years CS Ramakrishnan, AP Sahni, Surajt Ghosh and I formed our batch’s team. In the first year, we lost by one point to the 4th Years.

The Fourth Years answered the last question wrongly, but the Judge declared it was correct, more a question of bias, as “How can the First Years beat Fourth Years???”. I still remember the question. It was “What is larboard in nautical terms?” The Fourth Years’ answer was “Starboard”, which was totally wrong but declared right by the Judge / Quiz Master. The right answer was “Port side”., which answer I knew and would have got us into the lead. Larboard was an archaic term used on old sailing ships. The Quiz Master quickly declared the Fourth Years as winners even as protests rose from some of the Officers who were in the audience.

As an aside, I can’t help but slip in a truism.

Today, we imagine 'grandeur' when we come across the word "Posh".

The word “POSH” comes from “Port Outbound, Starboard Homebound”. Rich visitors sailing out of England to India wanted cabins on the port side of the ship and, on the return voyage, wanted cabins on the starboard side. The reason was - they wanted to see the coast always, as vessels on those voyages sailed close to the coast.

We won the quiz competition easily in 2nd and 3rd Years. We were supplanted by Senior Cadet Captains in the 4th Year, when they lost miserably.

Boxing: Although banned as a sport several years before, our rudimentary, open air gymnasium still had some boxing equipment. Rajan Isaac, Subin Das and I used to 'spar' regularly. It was good fun, getting hit, grinning sheepishly and saying "good one:.

In total contrast, the hostel of today has very modern gym equipment, as good as any other private gym, where you pay a king's ransom.

Stage Play ‘Tughlaq’: A version of Cho’s Tughlak, we performed this play in the 4th year, with Wayte and Deshpande as the principal players. Well appreciated by the Annual Day audience.

Republic Day and Independence Day Parades: DMET’s contingent were a regular feature of the Calcuttan landscape during the Republic Day and Independence Day parades. Turned out smartly in white caps, tunics, trousers and suede shoes for Independence Day parades and in Reefers for the Republic Day Parades, we were the connoisseur of most female eyes during the march past. Our marching would not have earned us any medals, but the ladies did not mind.

Final Passing Out Parade: This was another colourful affair. My guests were CD Krishnamurthy’s sister’s family.

And thus my DMET days ended.

I had to wait in Calcutta for more than a month after finishing College, in order to do my MOT (Ministry of Transport) Second Class Part ‘A’, the first step towards certifying myself as a ship’s engineer on Foreign Going vessels.

The clerks in the MMD office asked for a treat as they handed me my Certificate. I treated the four of them to ‘mishti’, ‘samosa’ and tea at the adjacent ‘dhaba’, those appendages / mini restaurants with a small (illegal) shack with wayside benches that usually proliferate next to large offices or colonies.

These ‘dhabas’ had their own charm. I would, many years later, remember them as the Indianised version of the Paris sidewalk cafes that are glorified as tourist attractions.

Successfully done, having the Certificate in hand, I boarded the train and, bidding goodbye to Calcutta, left for Chennai.

Even in the final moments of my stay on Calcuttan soil, an event occurred that provided an everlasting memory.

Having boarded the train, I was sitting at a window seat, watching the passersby and the vendors on the platform. A group of 5, slightly elder to me, came to the opposite seats, stuffed two two trunks under the seat and nonchalantly went out of the compartment and were grouped together, snacking at a vendor's stall. As I watched, two others mingled with them for a few minutes, walked into the compartment, took out the two trunks and walked out from another exit. When I raised my eyebrows in a query, they muttered that they had been allotted berths in First Class.

A few minutes later, as the train moved out, 2 of the group waved goodbye to their friends and scrambled aboard. After sitting in front of me, it took them a few minutes to note that their trunks were missing. When I told them the sequence of events, they realised they had been outsmarted by thieves due to their own negligence.

The next few decades were spent in the crystallisation of a career at sea, a “sea change” as it were. Family fortunes improved and I was able to make my parent’s old age a little more comfortable, got my sisters married and, finally, changed the rustic way of life into a semblance of modernity.

===== "Marine Musings 3" Ends =====

=="Marine Musings 4" and Blog 16 will start with my first ship experiences ==

Rangan