in 1755 . ,
Burma, January 1945. leaves
Hong Kong for
Japan as part of the Allied forces of occupation.
East India Company 1612–1830, the Bombay Marine The
East India Company was established in 1599, and it began to create a fleet of fighting ships in 1612, soon after Captain
Thomas Best defeated the
Portuguese at the
Battle of Swally. This led the company to build a port and to establish a small navy based at
Suvali, in
Surat,
Gujarat, to protect its trade routes. The Company named the force the 'Honourable East India Company's Marine', and the first fighting ships arrived on 5 September 1612. This force protected
merchant shipping off the
Gulf of Cambay and the rivers
Tapti and
Narmada. The ships also helped map the coastlines of India, Persia and Arabia. During the 17th century, the small naval fleet consisted of a few English warships and a large number of locally built gunboats of two types,
ghurabs and
gallivats, crewed by local fishermen. The larger
ghurabs were heavy, shallow-draft
gunboats of 300 tons (
bm) each, and carried six 9 to 12-pounder guns; the smaller
gallivats were about 70 tons (bm) each and carried six 2 to 4-pounder guns. In 1635, the East India Company established a
shipyard at
Surat, where they built four
pinnaces and a few larger vessels to supplement their fleet. In 1686, with most of the English commerce moving to
Bombay, the force was renamed the "Bombay Marine". Between 1830 and 1854 the Indian Navy was responsible for maintaining mail service on the Bombay and Suez leg of the "overland route" (England–Alexandria, Alexandria–Suez overland, and Suez–Bombay).
1830–1858 In 1830, the Bombay Marine was renamed the "Indian Navy". The British capture of
Aden in the
Aden Expedition increased its commitments, leading to the creation of the "Indus Flotilla". The Navy then took part in the
First Opium War of 1840. In 1852, at the outset of the
Second Anglo-Burmese War, ships of Her Majesty's Indian Navy joined a
Royal Navy force under the command of
Admiral Charles Austen to assist
General Godwin in the capture of
Martaban and
Rangoon. Nabarun Rudra Paul, the great captain of India leased that time.
Direct British rule in India After the end of
Company rule in India following the
Indian rebellion of 1857, the force came under the command of the British government of India and was formally named "Her Majesty's Indian Navy". to help formulate maritime and naval laws. These laws were first formulated and codified in the "Indian Marine Act, 1887" and followed by an amendment act to the same in the next year. The former adopted the general lines of the Naval Discipline and Indian Navy Acts as far as possible, whilst the latter merely supplied deficiencies in regard to grading and rating. In recognition of its fighting services, HMIM was given the title of "Royal Indian Marine" in 1892. By this time it consisted of over fifty vessels. In 1905, the service was described as having "Government vessels engaged in troop-ship, surveying, police or revenue duties in the East Indies". When mines were detected off the coasts of Bombay and Aden, during the
First World War, the Royal Indian Marine went into action with a fleet of
minesweepers, patrol vessels and troop carriers. Besides patrolling, the Marine ferried troops and carried war stores from India to
Mesopotamia (now
Iraq),
Egypt and
East Africa. The first Indian to be granted a commission was Engineer Sub-Lieutenant D.N. Mukherji, who joined the Royal Indian Marine as an officer on 6 January 1923.
World War II In 1934, the Royal Indian Marine changed its name, with the enactment of the Indian Navy (Discipline) Act 1934. The Royal Indian Navy was formally inaugurated on 2 October 1934, at Bombay. Its ships carried the prefix
HMIS, for His Majesty's Indian Ship. At the start of the
Second World War, the Royal Indian Navy was small, with only eight warships. The onset of the war led to an expansion in vessels and personnel described by one writer as "phenomenal". By 1943 the strength of the RIN had reached twenty thousand. Later , , , , also anti-aircraft sloops, completed similar periods in the U.K. waters escorting convoys in the Atlantic and dealing with attacks from hostile U-boats, aircraft and glider bombs. These six ships and the minesweepers all eventually proceeded to India carrying out various duties in the North Atlantic, Mediterranean and Cape stations en route. The fleet minesweepers were , , , , , , , , . The sloops and played a role in
Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of
Sicily by providing air defence and anti-submarine screening to the invasion fleet. Furthermore, the Royal Indian Navy participated in convoy escort duties in the Indian Ocean and Mediterranean and was heavily involved in combat operations as part of the
Burma Campaign, carrying out raids, shore bombardment, naval invasion support and other activities.
Royal Indian Naval combat losses The sloop
HMIS Pathan was sunk in June 1940 by the Italian Navy Submarine
Galvani during the
East African Campaign In the days immediately following the
Attack on Pearl Harbor, was patrolling the
Laccadive Islands in search of Japanese ships and submarines. At midnight on 9 December 1941, HMS
Glasgow sank the RIN patrol vessel with two
lighters in tow en route to Karachi, with 6-inch shells at .
Prabhavati was alongside the lighters and was mistaken for a surfaced Japanese submarine. was sunk by a Japanese aircraft during the Burma Campaign on 6 April 1942.
Royal Indian Naval successes was ordered in 1939, and built by
William Denny and Brothers. She was
commissioned in 1941, and with World War II underway, was immediately deployed as a convoy escort.
Jumna served as an anti-aircraft escort during the
Java Sea campaign in early 1942, and was involved in intensive anti-aircraft action against attacking Japanese twin-engined level bombers and dive bombers, claiming five aircraft downed from 24 to 28 February 1942. In June 1942, was involved in the defence of Sydney Harbour during the
attack on Sydney Harbour. On 11 November 1942,
Bengal was escorting the Dutch tanker to the southwest of
Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean. Two Japanese
commerce raiders armed with six-inch guns attacked
Ondina.
Bengal fired her single four-inch gun and
Ondina fired her 102 mm and both scored hits on , which shortly blew up and sank. On 12 February 1944, the was depth charged and sunk east-south-east off Visakhapatnam, India by the Indian sloop and the Australian corvettes and .
Ro-110 had attacked convoy JC-36 (Colombo-Calcutta) and torpedoed and damaged the British merchant
Asphalion (6,274 GRT). On 12 August 1944, the was sunk near the
Seychelles, in position 03º35'S, 52º49'E, by
depth charges from and the British frigate
HMS Findhorn. The mutiny found widespread support and spread all over India, including elements in the
Army and the
Air Force. A total of seventy-eight ships, twenty shore establishments and 20,000 sailors were involved in this mutiny.
Transition to Independence and Partition On 1 March 1947, the designation of "Flag Officer Commanding, Royal Indian Navy" was replaced with that of "Commander-in-Chief, Royal Indian Navy." Following India's independence in 1947 and the ensuing partition, the Royal Indian Navy was divided between the newly independent
Dominion of India and the
Dominion of Pakistan, and the Armed Forces Reconstitution Committee divided the ships and men of the Royal Indian Navy between India and Pakistan. The division of the ships was on the basis of two-thirds of the fleet to India, one third to Pakistan. The committee allocated to the
Royal Pakistan Navy (RPN) three of the seven active sloops, , and , four of the ten serviceable
minesweepers, two
frigates, two
naval trawlers, four harbour launches and a number of
Harbour Defence Motor Launches. 358 personnel, and 180 officers, most of whom were Muslims or Europeans, volunteered to transfer to the RPN. India retained the remainder of the RIN's assets and personnel, and many British officers opted to continue serving in the RIN.
Dominion of India In May 1948,
Ajitendu Chakraverti became the first Indian commodore in the post-independence RIN, in the appointment of Chief of Staff Naval HQ. On 21 June 1948, the additional designation of "Chief of the Naval Staff" was added before that of "Commander-in-Chief, Royal Indian Navy." In January 1949, the first batch of 13 Indian officers began their flight training, initiating the process which would lead to the formation of the
Indian Naval Air Arm. On 26 January 1950, when India adopted its current
constitution and became a
republic, the Royal Indian Navy became the
Indian Navy. Its vessels were redesignated as "Indian Naval Ships", and the "HMIS" ship prefix for existing vessels was changed to 'INS'. At 9:00 that morning, the
White Ensign of the Royal Navy was struck and replaced with the
Indian Naval Ensign, with the
Flag of India in its canton, symbolically completing the transition to the new Indian Navy. ==Commanding officers==