Commodore Rahul Vilas Gokhale took over the command of INS Circars from Commodore K.A. Bopanna here on Saturday.
Later, the outgoing Commanding Officer was given a farewell by officers and sailors of INS Circars through the traditional pulling out ceremony.
Commodore Bopanna is retiring from active naval service on Sunday after an illustrious career of 35 years.
INS Circars is the oldest naval establishment on the East Coast and the base depot ship providing administrative and logistics support to the Headquarters, Eastern Naval Command and a large number of units based in and around Visakhapatnam.
Commodore Gokhale, who will be the twenty-third Commanding Officer of INS Circars, is an alumnus of National Defence Academy and was commissioned into the Indian Navy on January 1, 1992.
A navigation and direction specialist, he has commanded ships INS Khukri and INS Kolkata. His other tenures include Director Personnel Policy at Naval Headquarters, New Delhi and Naval Advisor, High Commission of India at Islamabad, Pakistan.
The officer has undergone courses at DSSC Wellington, Naval War College, Goa and the Australian Defence College, Canberra. Prior to this appointment, he was Fleet Operations Officer, Eastern Fleet.
