Write up by Ash
By swiveling one’s memory to the January of 1976 and the central lobby of Foxtrot Squadron where the 55th were congregating as first termers; it could be seen within that motley group that were meeting each other as fledglings that there were four – Shamsher Singh Sangwan, Ram Bhaj Singh Suhag, Sanjay Saxena and Akhilesh Kumar Namdeo who greeted each other as old pals, they were after all, the ambassadors of Sainik School, Rewa. To me, within the world that I had then grown up in, Rewa stood out as the place where Tigers were bountiful and where the “white” strain had first evolved. And as alI of us would also soon see, this belief was borne out since each of them had the fierceness, the physical strength and the character of this formidable species.
Akhilesh may have looked diminutive but there was a certain hard compactness in that wiry frame that stood at odds to a person with a certain gentleness. It was this calmness in Akhilesh that reminds all of us as to what Leo Tolstoy had in that severe cold of Russia’s winter when he had written in January 1902 with a renewed resolve for moral betterment, “The kinder and the more thoughtful a person is, the more kindness he can find in other people. Kindness enriches our life; with kindness mysterious things become clear, difficult things become easy, and dull things become cheerful.”
In the shakeup that occurred after our second term when to allow 57th NDA course unfettered access to NDA, Fox (and Delta, Juliet) had exported all except 52nd Course to other Squadrons, that Akhilesh went to Bravo Squadron and was retained there. He excelled in academics and feline grace of his “Rewa tiger affiliation” saw him shining in his outdoors as well, in fact his journey in NDA, encapsulated in the pen picture of the NDA passing out journal recalls him with a rare, underlying tenderness, “If one saw a set of stripes (with a glitter atop) and moustaches coming towards him, then it had to be our Namu. Always lost himself in the bike racks or the tearoom. Good at PT”
As Sanjai Sawant recalls with great warmth, “Akhilesh affectionately known as Namu was a Technical Branch Officer, a Marine Engineer. He spent most of his tenure in Vizag. In fact, he stayed in the same flat 1 Jai in NOFRA Vizag for more than a decade. We used to pull his leg that he should ask for a transfer so that his two doting daughters Abhilasha and Alanksha should understand what a house shifting during transfer means. Namu was a very dear friend and a professionally outstanding Officer. He had excelled in every academic subject during his engineering degree training at INS Shivaji, Lonavla which he had joined with three other course mates within a year of passing out of NDA – Panse/Charli; Dhaliwal/Bravo and PS Verma/Alpha”.
Namu had an untimely demise triggered by a cardiac arrest while in service as a Commanding Officer at Raipur NCC from where he was to retire soon.
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Course, this day marks his birthday as Sharmila reminded us this morning with a soulful rendition of a remembrance with a song. His elder daughter Abhilasha is an environment graduate married to a Merchant Navy officer at Pune and younger one Akanksha graduated as a fashion designer and presently works at Mumbai. Sharmila is at Nagpur; that Namu shares his birthday with such tall national personalities of this Nation was perhaps ordained and a reflection of his personality. For the rest of us, life ebbs on as we gather within the arms of our memories the precious time that we have spent with each other.
Penned with inputs from Sanjai Savant and the guidance of Pradeep Mishra and Ramesh.
May his soul rest in peace