AFVOA Newsletters of Year 2012

Page 71 of 80 designed to carry armed troops to distant shores. This ship is also used for disaster relief and evacuation duties. Rana and Ranvijay are missile destroyers of Soviet origin. The other K class missile corvettes are indigenously developed ships which are armed with surface to surface missiles and guns. The Governor of Tamil Nadu HE Dr. K Rosaiah was the Chief Guest. He along with over 2500 guests from different walks of life embarked on various ships. We had 50 slots for our members and their guests to go to sea on 27 Oct 2012. The Navy has been generous with us considering that the demands on them year after year have been increasing for slots on this event. Cmde Shekhar and Cdr Prasad have been our interface with the Navy and evidently they have been able to ensure that we get our 50 slots this year also. Our grateful thanks to them. The weather held out on 27 Oct and the veterans and families, approx 50 in number, had a whale of a time as I understand from the various inputs I have received after the event. I am grateful to Col Hariharan, Capt Balakrishnan, Col Ram, Maj Pillai, and a host of others who gave me their feedback. There were several points that need our attention so that in the coming years we are able to enjoy the event without any minor glitches. We need volunteers from the Association to do the preliminary arrangements and be present at the venues to ensure proper liaison. We also need a team leader to be nominated from the group participating in the event. (We did nominate a team leader; unfortunately he dropped out at the last moment due to some family commitments). The Navy, as always, has been more than hospitable and our sincere thanks to the organizers for the arrangements and the opportunity provided to us and our families to go to sea. Special thanks to Cmde Shekhar and Cdr Prasad for their commitment and efforts. We are proud of them. Permit me to let you read some of the messages ( or part thereof ) as received by me. Thanks for your effort to get entry to Family Day At Sea. As per inst, we reported at 0700 hrs in Naval Officers mess. Thanks to Cdr. Prasad, with his own commitments came before us, and distributed entry passes with coupon for breakfast, snacks and lunch. Conveyance was provided from Mess to Port Trust and back after the trip. At the entry point to the ship Jalashwa, good breakfast pack was given. Three different enclosures one for VVIPs (Tamil Nadu Governor and his family ), one for Governor's guest and those were given with personal invitation ( VIP) and the third one for rest of all with red colour passes which includes, serving officers, veterans and all other ranks. However, serving and retired officers and their families managed to make an entry to the second enclosure. Ship moved from the harbour at about 1015 hrs immediate on arrival of Governor. At 1100 hrs snacks were served. Some demonstration with other ships and helicopter, on firing, movements of person to other ship etc have been est. Lunch was served at 1300 hrs. The lunch laid out in the VIP enclosure was served for those with personal invitation card, as catered for them only. Rest others were asked to collect the pack (veg/non veg briyani) from the third enclosure, which was so crowded. We came out at about 1400 hrs. Maj C M Pillai ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------