Admiral Dhowan appointed as new Navy chief

[Dem!god]

Admiral Robin Dhowan was on Thursday appointed as new chief of the Indian Navy after DK Joshi had quit in the wake of a mishap on baord a submarine killing scores of men.

Controversy had broken out in the Navy with the government’s move to appoint Dhowan as the next chief, doing away after decades with the seniority principle that has been adopted in the past to select service chiefs.

While the case itself is unprecedented — no service chief has quit midway in a term like D K Joshi — a crisis is at hand given that the continuation of Vice Admiral Shekhar Sinha as the western navy chief may become untenable after Dhowan’s appointment, given that the latter is junior to the former.

Sinha may take legal recourse — by first representing to the ministry and then going to court — by invoking the case of Sureesh Mehta’s appointment to the top post that was not deterred by the war room leaks controversy.

In its recommendation of Dhowan, the MoD has taken the view that Sinha was at the helm of affairs when several accidents took place at the western command that ultimately led to Joshi’s exit and that accountability lies with him too.

The final nail in the coffin that led to Joshi’s resignation was a fire on the Sindhuratna submarine in which two officers were killed. It has emerged in the inquiry that basic standard operating procedures of putting on gas masks were not followed that led to casualties.

Admiral Dhowan appointed as new Navy chief | The Indian Express