Tamil Nadu Maritime Heritage Museum won’t be ready anytime soon
Chennai: The Vela-class warhorse INS Vagli, anchored at the port here since April last year since it was brought back from the shores of Mamallapuram, is unlikely to be ready soon in its new avatar as a submarine museum.
The officials are scouting for a competent agency with expertise in handling submarines to haul it on to the shore and facilitate the establishment of a museum.
The Indian Navy’s decommissioned submarine INS Vagli is the main component of the prestigious Tamil Nadu Maritime Heritage Museum being planned by the Tamil Nadu Tourism Development Corporation (TTDC) at the world heritage site.
The project was originally scheduled to be ready by mid-2015 but Corporation could not get the vessel hauled onto the shore owing to inclement weather and lack of skilled professionals.
“We are considering several options. One is to completely dismantle the vessel and assemble it after transportation by sea and another is to request the Indian Navy, which has the expertise, to haul it on to beach,” a senior tourism official explained.
The corporation has been struggling owing to lack of technical help and its earlier attempt to tow it Mamallapuram turned futile. If the Indian Navy agrees and swings into action, this Foxtrot class submarine, inducted into service by then Lieutenant Commander Lalit Talwar on August 10, 1974, at Riga, Latvia, in erstwhile Soviet Union, will be the centre of attraction at the museum. It was towed to Mamallapuram on April 6 last year and attempts by a contractor to haul it to the shore using steel plates and airbags ended in failure.
On April 21, it was brought back to Chennai harbour owing to security threat and also a rough sea that posed a perennial problem to the submarine.
A channel of about 100 metres was dug to facilitate the easy movement of the submarine from the high seas to the shore. But, the channel got filled with sludge and thus hampered the smooth movement of the submarine.
Despite setbacks, the Corporation intends to accomplish this mammoth task under BOOT basis through Public Private Partnership Mode. It has even earmarked 30-acres of its land in Mamallapuram for establishing the maritime museum.
The submarine, decommissioned by Indian Navy on December 9, 2010, in Visakhapatnam after 36 years of service under 23 commanding officers, was brought to Chennai in March 25, 2013 after it was officially handed over to the state government for the museum project.
