Why was naval commando re-deployed?

By Nirnimesh Kumar

NEW DELHI, JAN 6. Why was the naval commando, Satbir Singh, who allegedly manoeuvered an armed intrusion into the Navy chief's residence here on December 1, re-deployed on duty when he had been declared ``psychologically unfit'' for the job in 1998?

According to reliable sources, his unit commander on the INS Kalinga naval ship in Visakhapatnam had declared him unfit for commando duty after keeping his behaviour under observation for a couple of months. On the commander's report, Satbir was transferred to Delhi to be deployed on a low-demanding job. But after some time, he was again, inexplicably, put on commando duty at the Navy House.

During interrogation by the Delhi police Crime Branch, Satbir admitted that he had enacted the ``intrusion drama'' to get discharged from the job as he was not in a normal mental balance due to some family problems.

From day one when the Military Intelligence began questioning Satbir, he had been telling that there was no other reason to his stagemanaging the intrusion drama but to quit the job to stay with his parents in his village in Rohtak district of Haryana.

When he came back to rejoin duty on the INS Kalinga naval ship, he made a written request to the Navy headquarters to release him from the service. The application is still under consideration. His mother had also written a letter to the President urging him to allow her son to quit the job.

When Satbir felt that there was no hope of his being discharged from the job immediately, he chalked out a plan to create a spectacle of an intrusion into the Navy House which would pave the way for dismissal and he would get a compensation on disability ground.

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