1971 Indo-Pak war hero Inder Singh, known for sinking PNS Ghazi submarine, passes away
Commander Inder Singh (retired), who famously sank the Pakistani submarine PNS Ghazi during the 1971 war, passed away on Monday night in Haryana. He was cremated on Tuesday at Rambagh on the Sheela bypass with full state honours.
As per a TOI report, Commander Singh had been admitted to a local private hospital on October 2, where he later succumbed to his illness. The district administration, including Sub-Divisional Magistrate Rakesh Kumar Saini, Wing Commander Gorika Suhag, Welfare Officer of Zila Sainik Board Jagbir Singh, and Ravinder Kumar, paid their respects at the funeral.
The sinking of the PNS Ghazi was a significant event during the 1971 war. On November 14, 1971, the Pakistani submarine, leased from the US, set sail from Karachi with the intention of destroying the Indian aircraft carrier INS Vikrant at Visakhapatnam, the headquarters of the Eastern Naval Command.
In a daring move, the INS Rajput, an aging World War II destroyer commanded by Lieutenant Inder Singh, was tasked with the dangerous mission of acting as a decoy to divert the PNS Ghazi's attention. Lieutenant Singh, hailing from the village of Aewali in Rohtak district, successfully sank the enemy submarine before it could reach Chittagong in East Pakistan, which later became Bangladesh after the war.
In a conversation with TOI in 2017, Commander Inder Singh recollected the events of that fateful day, stating, «It was November 30, 1971, when Commander-in-Chief Vice Admiral Nilakanta Krishnan summoned me to his office in Visakhapatnam and assigned me this suicide mission.
