A solo sail
circumnavigation seemed to be the preserve of foreign sailors. India, despite
its huge maritime presence, was yet to achieve this milestone. But Project
Sagar Parikrama with Commander Dilip Donde at the helm was to change that,
making him, in the process, the first Indian to do so. “The idea was mooted by
Vice Admiral Manohar Awati, who was keen that an Indian should attempt such a
journey,” recalls Cdr Donde who volunteered in 2006. “The aim of the project
was to build a boat in India and undertake a solo journey.”
A specialised
diver with the navy for 25 years, Cdr Donde hardly envisioned the challenges
ahead. “It took use three years to build the boat and ploughing through the
various bureaucratic procedures, before I undertook the actual journey. Building the boat was a project in itself as
nobody had built a boat of these specifications before. Builder Ranakar Dandekar is the unsung hero,”
reveals Cdr Donde who teamed up with Dandekar to build the boat at Divar
Island, sharing his sailing knowhow.
Meeting deadlines and budgets despite importing all equipment, the boat
was delivered to the Indian Navy in February 2009.
Deviating from
the norm, the stately yet sturdy and functional 56-foot Mhadei with a wood core
and fibre glass and outfitted with manual winches, six sails, a 25-metre mast
and the latest GPS, has come to mean something very special to this sailor who
spent 157 days negotiating her through the southern seas, covering a distance
of 23,000 nautical miles (nm). “My personal aim was to groom another person
after me,” he reveals. His wish was fulfilled when his protégé Abhilash Tomy
undertook a non-stop solo circumnavigation in 151 days.
An endeavour to
sail solo requires an endurance of both, spirit and physical fitness. “Since I
had no predecessor, I had to train myself and sailed wherever I could. I went
to UK and volunteered to work for Robin Knox – the first man to solo
circumnavigate the world. It gave me an exposure as to what sailing a big boat
requires,” explains Cdr Donde, who set sail on August 19 2009, taking to the southern
seas from Mumbai to Australia, along the western edge of the Pacific and across
Cape Horn, making just four stops along the way at Freemantle, Littleton (NZ),
Port Stanley and Cape Town. Along the way, he braved gusting winds and
25-30-foot waves, broken steering wheels and auto pilots beeping off, but he
and Mhadei kept a steady path to return to Mumbai in May 2010. “One of my
biggest fears was falling off the boat,” recalls Cdr Donde, who nevertheless
enjoyed the solitude of the journey.
Encapsulating all
these experiences five years later in his book ‘The First Indian: Story of the
First Indian Solo Circumnavigation under Sail’, Cdr Donde explains why the
preceding three years are as important as the second part which is an
elaboration of the blog he began to write within two days of his journey. The
blog which was so widely followed now welcomes the story of the first Indian
who blazed a trail in the annals of Indian maritime history.
(A book reading
of ‘The First Indian: Story of the First Indian Solo Circumnavigation under
Sail’ will be held at Literati, Calangute today at 7pm. Elias Patel will be in
conversation with the author)