Dhruvak to Dhruv: The multifaceted world of Indian warship building

The Indian Navy is justly proud of its warship building odyssey and its pioneering role in ‘Making in India’. As ‘atmanirbharta’ became the new Indian mantra in the last decade, the Navy has not only added huge numbers of ships, designed and built in India, to its inventory but also shaped the discourse because of its lead in this endeavour.

For a long time, many of us, naval history lovers, believed that the journey of warship building in independent India began with INS Ajay, a small seaward defence boat in September 1960, made a huge leap with INS Darshak, a hydrography (survey) vessel inducted in 1964, and achieved a major milestone with our first ‘propah’ indigenous warship, INS Nilgiri, which was commissioned in 1972.

However, during my visit to the Hindustan Shipyard Limited (HSL) Museum a few months ago in Visakhapatnam, my eye fell on an exhibit mentioning INS Dhruvak, a ship built by HSL for the Indian Navy and delivered in November 1959. I was gobsmacked; if this was so, it changed the whole equation, and it was not Ajay (built by Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers, GRSE, Kolkota) but Dhruvak, built by HSL, that now seemed to occupy the pole position.

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Such situations are happy dilemmas for history mavens. It led me to research a bit more on the subject. The archives of HSL record that “INS Dhruvak, the first Naval ship, a Mooring Vessel, was built by Hindustan Shipyard Limited, Visakhapatnam, for the Indian Navy." It further states that “the keel was laid on January 27, 1956, and was launched on July 16, 1958. The vessel was delivered to the Indian Navy on November 16, 1959. The vessel has a length of 150 feet, a beam of 32 feet, and 900 tonnes of displacement. It has been fitted with a steam-reciprocating engine with coal-fired marine boilers.”

Other photographic records and logs further substantiate this. Dhruvak was launched by Mrs. Kamli Heble, the wife of Cmde (later Rear Admiral) MK Heble, the then Commodore East Coast (COMEAST). Further, the then Chief of the Naval Staff, Vice Admiral RD Katari, visited HSL on November 18, 1958, and reviewed the progress on Dhruvak, accompanied by Cmde Heble. The HSL log of ships-built lists INS Dhruvak at serial 25, and HSL Directors’ annual reports of both 1958–59 and 59–60 mention INS Dhruvak having been built and delivered to the Navy. The HSL yearbook of 2023 further emphasises that Dhruvak was the first indigenous ship built for the Navy. Wikipedia (admittedly not the best of reference sources) also lists Dhruvak as an ‘IN’ Ship.

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However, in the book “Blueprint to Bluewater” (Lancer, 1992), the official naval history for the period 1950–1965, author Rear Admiral Satyindra Singh gives INS Ajay the honour of being the first ship indigenously built for the Navy (pp. 85–86), while making due mention of INS Darshak, constructed by HSL in 1964, as the first major warship built by India and the first one other than the aircraft carrier to carry a helicopter.

Not all naval records, though, are silent on Dhruvak. A perusal of naval history archives reveals that as early as February 1957, the Navy, being cognisant of a mooring vessel being manufactured for it by the HSL, recommended in its internal nomenclature committee meeting “that the vessel be called Dhruvak, derived from the Sanskrit word for stable, fixed, and steadfast." This was approved by the Government of India on March 18, 1957, a full 16 months before the launch. Incidentally, compared to Ajay, Dhruvak was much bigger, at 900 tonnes (500 tonnes in some accounts), almost a heavyweight compared to 150 tonnes of the former.

Why this anomaly, then? The gap is probably in the fact that while Dhruvak was, possibly, meant to be a commissioned ship for the Navy, it was subsequently used as an auxiliary. In other words, it is not clear if the ship was commissioned and flew a white ensign or if she was an auxiliary that flew a blue ensign. Further, was she a grey-hulled auxiliary (like Fleet Support ships and tankers) or did she have the dockyard colour scheme of yellow and black? A query among navy veterans who served at that time elicited varying responses. While most of them had a very clear recollection of the vessel and her name, there was some difference of opinion about her status. But going by most accounts and some extrapolation, it would seem that while the Navy probably intended to commission her as a ship and, hence, the string of high-profile events around her at that time, it had a change of mind subsequently. Thus, she remained a dockyard auxiliary. Interestingly, there was no change in plan regarding her role. She was inducted as a mooring vessel and used in that capacity.

So, what did a mooring vessel do? Why did the Navy need one? It must be noted that unlike today, in the 1960s and 1970s, the berthing space for big ships was extremely restricted or not available. Destroyers were often at anchorage, and aircraft carriers like Vikrant and cruisers like Delhi and Mysore were moored at buoys.

A dedicated ship like the Dhruvak was needed to lay these buoys. Further, these large mooring buoys also required servicing and relaying periodically. Dhruvak was also later used to lay buoys at the Angria Bank, a cartographically designated body of water in the Arabian Sea close to the Konkan coast, to moor (to secure with multiple buoys) the Battle Practice Target (BPT) for practice missile firings. It was also used in various other support roles, including in the degaussing of ships. Vice Admiral JS Bedi, former FOCinC Western Naval Command, recollects that “Dhruvak had an ocean-going master with a proper ticket, one Mr Unni”.

Thus, it seems that even while sporting the black and yellow colour scheme and wearing the blue ensign, Dhruvak probably did much more than other yard craft and was frequently on the high seas. It also shows us that, though designated as auxiliaries, some vessels in that category are as busy and spirited as the commissioned ships that wear the white ensign. Dhruvak was one of them. This is particularly evident in the affectionate remembrance of the vessel among many veterans; normally, yardcraft do not engender that kind of nostalgia. We have no idea when Dhruvak was decommissioned or paid off, but Capt. Mohan Ram, one of our shipbuilding legends, remembers having undertaken refits of Dhruvak and “that it was not in great shape in the late seventies."

However, Cdr GVK Unnithan, a navy raconteur of yore, recollects that Dhruvak had the ‘cleanest engine room’ and was around until early nineties. This implies that Dhruvak had a charmed life and served the Indian Navy for close to five decades.

Therefore, to me, it remains a technicality as to which was first: Dhruvak or Ajay? The jury may be out on that. However, there is no doubt that there were several other firsts from the HSL—India’s first green field shipyard—such as the first modern steamship MV Jala Usha delivered in 1948, the aforementioned INS Darshak, the legendary Merchant Marine Training Ship TS Rajendra (1972), and the first Indian Offshore Patrol Vessel, INS Savitri, in 1990, among others.

This recall of the HSL is important today, on April 5, which is National Maritime Day. It bears mention that this day celebrates a brave act when, on April 5, 1919, the first Indian-owned ship, SS Loyalty of the Scindia Steamship Navigation, journeyed from Mumbai to London via Marseilles. This was a landmark occurrence because the shipping routes, companies, trade, and, indeed, the oceans were dominated by the British. Here was a ‘swadeshi’ shipping company started by four courageous Indians: Walchand Hirachand, Narottam Morarjee, Lallubhai Samaldas, and Kilachand Devchand, who dared to dream big and challenge the British monopoly over ocean navigation. At that juncture, Walchand Hirachand Doshi, India’s great maritime visionary, also realised the need for a ‘swadeshi’ shipyard that could build and repair ships to sustain indigenous shipping. Thus, he established the Scindia Shipyard in 1941, which, subsequently, in 1952, was incorporated as HSL.

Interestingly, HSL also has another first, which has not been given adequate attention. As early as 1970, it undertook the refit of two Egyptian submarines, completing the job in two years, viz., mid-1972.

This was the first ever refit of submarines in India and a remarkable achievement considering that India had just about acquired submarines in the late 1960s and our own expertise in technical matters of submarines was nascent. While the refit was, no doubt, undertaken in collaboration with Russian personnel, it still tells a great deal about aspects of decision-making, defence diplomacy, and technical competence. Why this line of effort was not utilised subsequently, both in operational matters and as a foreign cooperation endeavour, remains a matter of mystery. Even more interestingly, this wheel too seemed to have come full circle almost 50 years later when the INS Sindhuvir, an Indian Sindhughosh (Kilo) class submarine, was extensively refitted by HSL before being handed over to the Myanmar Navy in October 2020 and being renamed as UMS Minye Theinkhathu.

These musings on National Maritime Day tell us many things. One, HSL for long, unfairly perhaps, considered a laggard in shipbuilding, has not only undertaken several interesting and pioneering initiatives but has also, in the last decade, turned a corner in its performance.

In 2023, it had a highest ever turnover of Rs 1,103 crore and year on year growth of 46 per cent. In recent years, the shipyard has also received many awards for its corporate performance. It is possible that this is true of other shipyards too, and that’s a happy augury, because maritime India needs many more ships—both commercial and men of war—to be built and repaired. The second and more important takeaway is that warship building is not about aircraft carriers or glamorous guided missile destroyers alone. They too come in all types and kinds, with different definitions and classifications. Shipyards, thus, need to build competencies and capacities for the full range of a country’s requirements.

Thus, it is nice to note that HSL is now onto another ‘first of its kind’ venture, building two diving support vessels (DSV) for the Navy—to be called Nistar and Nipun—with the first one expected to be delivered by the end of this year. At 9,000 tonnes, these ships will be huge and will have advanced underwater rescue capabilities. Similarly, having bagged the contract for five Fleet Support Ships (FSS) scheduled to enter service between 2027 and 2031, HSL will enter the league of big warship construction. At about 45,000 tonnes, the FSS will be a super behemoth. A floating dry dock is part of its programme too. And we are not even talking about warship and submarine refits, merchant ship construction and repairs, marine platform construction and maintenance, and the like. A growing, rising India will need more in each category.

The story of Dhruvak may be enveloped in a mist of mystery. The fact that it was the first vessel built for the Navy, the fact that it happened with the first Indian Navy Chief (RD Katari) at the helm, and the fact that it was built by a yard founded by Walchand Hirachand are sufficient to give it a unique identity. No such mystery exists, however, around another, more recent HSL product: INS Dhruv, a state-of-the-art, advanced ocean surveillance vessel. From Dhruvak to Dhruv is a fascinating story of the many facets of warship building in India. Today, Walchand Hirachand would indeed be a happy man. Maritime Day Greetings to readers.

The author is a navy veteran and writes on maritime issues. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.