The INS Magar -- the first amphibious warfare ship -- will finally rest her oars on Saturday winding up her 36 years of glorious service to the nation.
The decommissioning ceremony of the INS Magar -- carrying the naval designation of Landing Ship Tank (LST), Large (L) for its ability to carry tanks and other weapons -- is scheduled at Southern Naval Command, Kochi, on Saturday. Chief of Army Staff General Manoj Pande being the chief guest for the event, said the Navy officials.
After decades of active operational deployment, the ship changed base port to Kochi from Vishakhapatnam for training sea officers on April 10, 2018. She underwent modifications and joined First Training Squadron for training sea officers in various aspects of seamanship, navigation, ship handling, boat work, engineering and electrical departmental skills, amongst other disciplines, whilst also exposing the trainees to the rigorous way of life at sea, the Navy’s record stated.
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As a tribute, a slightly more than one-minute duration video made by the Navy eulogies the INS Magar, which in English means crocodile. Epithets used for her operational capabilities demonstrated in the past include; “Crocodiles Are Really Bold”, “Master of Land and Sea”, “Always Ready to Defend” and ends with “Saada Nidar Veer Magar” (Our Bold and Brave Magar).
Months before birthing the vessel forever, the Southern Naval Command has been organising events to celebrate its illustrious journey. For instance, a cycling expedition from Kochi to the 91 Infantry Brigade at Thiruvananthapuram and return was organised by the Navy on February 21.
Built by the Kolkata-based Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers (GRSE), the INS Magar, which is 120 metres long and has a beam of 17.5 metres, was deployed for milestone operations like Operation Pawan to support Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka after her July 15, 1987, commissioning, recall Naval sources.
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It’s also been called for humanitarian assistance disaster response (HADR), the latest was to evacuate post-Covid pandemic Indians from Male, the capital of Maldives, in 2020. But, the most noteworthy operation was in the wake of the 2004 Tsunami, wherein the ship chipped in to provide relief for over 1,300 survivors, the Navy’s appreciation of INS Magar read.
Nostalgia has started pouring in with the news of INS Magar’s decommissioning getting public. Former Naval officer Debashis Mukherjee took to Twitter and stated that he was the first officer to be posted on the INS Magar 6 months before its commissioning. “I served as Cdr(E). I really regret missing the decommissioning as I’m out of India. Goodbye INS Magar,” he tweeted.