Will be eyes & ears of fleet, say Navy’s first woman air combatants to operate from warship

In an interview to ThePrint, Sub Lieutenants Riti Singh & Kumudini Tyagi said they are lucky to be making history as first woman air combatants to stay on warship and operate from its deck.

Sub Lieutenants Riti Singh and Kumudini Tyagi of the Indian Navy | By special arrangement

New Delhi: The day they first filled up the form to join the Indian Navy, Sub Lieutenants Riti Singh, 25, and Kumudini Tyagi, 24, never knew they would one day serve on warships.

But with the Navy last week paving the way for both these young officers to operate as the first woman air combatants to stay on a warship and operate from its deck, they said they are eagerly looking forward to the challenge.

In an interview to ThePrint, the officers said they are lucky to be making history.

Women do not serve as sailors in the Indian Navy. Women officers were not permitted on corvettes, destroyers and aircraft carriers until now. The first woman officers to be posted onboard a warship was Surgeon Commander Vinita Tomar and Sub Lieutenant Rajeshwari Kori on INS Jyoti, a fleet support vessel, in 1997.

Sub Lt Singh told ThePrint: “Not everybody gets to be a part of history, but I think many more women will be sitting in place of us in the near future and lot of responsibility rests on our shoulders to do well.”

She added, “Not every 20-year-old gets to do something, which no one has done before. As much as we are looking forward to it, a lot of effort has been put into our training. We will continue to qualify on our specific aircraft for the next 9-10 months.”

They said they are also often told by other women officers to do well in the job as that will pave the way for other women officers, who are waiting to serve in the Navy. 

The officers are now gearing up for a difficult and competitive training for the next few months before they are finally deployed for operations.

Talking about fewer women in the Navy, they agreed there is a lack of general awareness about the opportunities that the Navy offers, which they said could be one of the reasons why fewer women enroll in the service.

“Being a graduate, I never thought I will be in a helicopter or will be firing torpedoes or dropping depth charges in the near future,” Sub Lt Tyagi said. “It is not a 9-5 job, it is a way of life,” she added.

There are over 600 women personnel in the Indian Navy, with some serving in indirect combat roles, such as observers and tactical operators on the armed maritime patrol aircraft — the P8I and the IL 38.

How their roles are different

As observers in the Navy, Sub Lt Singh said, they will not only assist the pilots in navigating aircraft, but they will also be in charge of all weapons and sensors in the aircraft. 

The observers’ responsibility is also to designate an aircraft or ship as friend or enemy and provide information to their own fleet, she said.

“We are the eyes and ears of the fleet. We go out there, we have speed advantage over the ships and we provide them with information in a quick manner,” she said.

Explaining how their roles would be different from other women officers who serve as observers in aircraft such as the P8I, Sub Lt Tyagi said the role of helicopter observers would mean taking off and landing in a ship, which is a moving platform, as against a fixed base.

“Women officers were inducted in the observer cadre in 2009. But they currently serve on fixed wing aircraft, where they take off from a fixed base and land there,” she said.

“In ship-borne helicopters, you take off from the ship and when you are to land, the ship is somewhere else as it is a moving platform,” she said.

The challenge, they said, will lie in the operation to be carried out.

‘Can’t be a greater opportunity if a woman commands a ship’

If the young officers opt for permanent commission in future and get selected, they can command a ship as well.

Asked about the prospect, the officers said if a woman officer gets to command a ship years down the line, there could not be a greater opportunity than it. 

“We go ahead and take whatever chance we are given. If women are given that, they will take that too,” Singh said. “But it is too early for us to comment on that,” she added.

The journey so far

Talking about her journey, Sub Lt Tyagi told ThePrint that she decided to join the armed forces in 2015 and was inspired by Lt Kiran Shekhawat, the Navy woman officer who died in the line of duty in a Dornier crash in 2015.

Her journey, however, was far from smooth as she was from a civil background, where people had limited knowledge about armed forces. She cleared the tough Services Selection Board (SSB) exams in her third attempt.

“I cleared SSB in my third attempt, but every time I realised that I’m closer to my aim,” she said, adding that her passion for the armed forces kept her going.

She said her family was very supportive too despite a general lack of awareness about the armed forces and the opportunities the Navy had to offer.

Sub Lt Singh, who comes from a Navy background, was inspired to join the Navy from the time she was a child. She said she specifically opted for a BTech degree as it increased her chances of getting into the armed forces. 

“I was surrounded by men in uniform. My father was a naval officer. Whenever I talked to them, I realised they are knowledgeable and disciplined.”

She said clearing the SSB was an obstacle with the large number of students applying for the exam, but just limited seats available. “I took it as one step at a time,” she added.