The Director General of Project Seabird (DG Seabird) is a senior appointment in the Indian Navy with the rank of Vice Admiral. The DG heads the Seabird Project with a charter to oversee the largest defence infrastructure project progressing at the Karwar Naval Base. The current DG is Vice Admiral Vivek Dahiya who took over on 1 August 2026.

Background In the early 1980s, then Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Admiral Oscar Stanley Dawson conceived of a naval base sandwiched between the hills of the Western Ghats and the Arabian Sea near Karwar in Karnataka state. Located south of the naval bases in Mumbai and Goa and north of Kochi, the location had advantages as being very close to the world's busiest shipping route between the Persian Gulf and east Asia and out of range of most strike aircraft from neighbouring countries. It offered a natural deep-water harbour and significant land area for expansion, allowing larger aircraft carriers to berth. However, due to a variety of reasons, including the 1991 economic crisis, development was delayed.

Project Seabird In 1999, following Pokhran-II, then Defence Minister George Fernandes approved Project Seabird to pursue the construction of the new naval base at Karwar. Larsen & Toubro was the lead contractor for the marine works on the harbour, in partnership with Hochtief, Ballast Nadem Dredging of the Netherlands, Radisson of Australia and Nedeco of The Netherlands. Over of breakwater was constructed using over 4.4 million cubic metres of rock to protect the harbour. The Binaga Bay was dredged and its rock outcrops blasted to allow even large aircraft carriers to turn inside the bay. Anjadip Island is one of the two islands to which the breakwaters are linked for reinforcement. A second channel will be added to the base to allow warships to simultaneously enter and exit the port .

List of Directors General

Director General Project SeabirdS.No. Name Assumed office Left office Notes1Vice Admiral S. K. Chand, 19 March 1986 24 August 19912Rear Admiral P. S. Das, 24 August 19911 October 1992Later Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief Eastern Naval Command.3Rear Admiral V. K. Malhotra, 1 October 199231 October 1994Later Flag Officer Commanding Maharashtra Naval Area4Rear Admiral M. Raman31 October 19949 November 19955Rear Admiral O. P. Bansal9 November 199515 November 1996Later Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief Eastern Naval Command.6Rear Admiral S. V. Gopalachari, 15 November 199613 October 1997Later Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff.7Vice Admiral Raman Puri, 13 October 1997 9 March 1999Later Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief Eastern Naval Command and Chief of Integrated Defence Staff.8Rear Admiral S. R. Sampath Gopal, 9 March 199930 April 2003Earlier Flag Officer Commanding Eastern Fleet.9Rear Admiral K. Mohanrao1 May 200331 December 200510Commodore P. C. Agrawal1 January 200626 March 200612Vice Admiral Sanjeev Bhasin, 26 March 2006 18 January 2007Later Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief Western Naval Command.13Rear Admiral B. R. Rao, Later Chief Hydrographer to Government of India.14Rear Admiral A. R. Radhakrishnan 15Rear Admiral C. S. Murthy, 16Vice Admiral Karambir Singh, Later Chief of the Naval Staff.17Vice Admiral Murlidhar Sadashiv Pawar, Later Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff.18Vice Admiral Ravneet Singh, Later Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff.19Vice Admiral Srikant, December 2019December 2020Earlier Commandant of the National Defence College.20Vice Admiral Puneet Kumar Bahl, 1 January 202124 December 2021Later Commandant of Indian Naval Academy.21Vice Admiral Tarun Sobti, 24 December 20211 October 2023Later Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff.22Vice Admiral Rajesh Dhankhar, 28 August 202431 May 2026Current Deputy Chief of Integrated Defence Staff (Doctrine, Organization & Training) 23Vice Admiral Vivek Dahiya , 1 August 2026IncumbentCurrent DG Project SeaBird https://www.facebook.com/IndianNavy/posts/pfbid02aDjTjHSGAHzU2BvVu2ihbcuDYNWeFFE6VWXrg5vPUjket9AcK99FkybxEqY5hL8Xl

See also INS Kadamba

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