.png)
1 month ago
2
ARTICLE AD BOX
THE treasured cargo of a cruise liner dubbed ‘India’s Titanic’ was secretly recovered 75 years after it was sunk by a Japanese submarine.
On November 20, 1942, the SS Tilawa departed from Mumbai, India, to Durban, South Africa, with 958 people on board including 732 passengers and four gunners.
Champion News
Instagram/@tilawa1942
Instagram/@tilawa1942As well as people, the steam ship was packed full with 6,000 tonnes of cargo which included 60 tonnes of silver bullion.
However, the ship only had nine lifeboats and when it was struck by two torpedos from a Japanese Imperial Navy submarine in the early hours of November 23.
The SS Tilawa sank to the bottom of the Indian Ocean, 930 miles northeast of the Seychelles along with its cargo.
The tragedy took the lives of 280 people despite the heroic rescues of hundreds of people by HMS Birmingham and SS Carthage.
BURIED TREASURE
With the tragedy becoming lost in the web of devastation during the Second World War, it was not until 2014, that attention turned back to India’s Titanic.
That year, British salvage company Argentum Exploration Ltd. launched a deep ocean search mission to find the wreckage site and survey the area.
The ship was located around 4,500 meters down and 800 miles from land.
It was lying on its port side at an angle of around 45 degrees after landing on a rocky ledge, according to the Tilawa commemoration website.
Three years after surveying it, Argentum successfully salvaged 2,364 of the 2,391 silver bars that were onboard after the Bombay Mint sold them to the Union of South Africa for coinage.
The treasured cargo was found in the opium room of the ship after the mail and species room were found empty.
It was then transported to the UK where Argentum, owned by hedge fund leader Paul Marchall, declared it as their property under maritime law claiming payment for recovery from South Africa.
However, South Africa refuted these claims and the issue was escalated to the Supreme Court which ruled in May that the $43 million silver belonged to South Africa.
SURVIVOR ACCOUNTS
Meanwhile, the remaining two known survivors of the wreckage continue to think about that day.
On November 22, 2023, the so-called ‘Forgotten Tragedy’ was commemorated by the Tilawa1942 organisation with a survivor dinner.
Alvind Jani who was three years old at the time detailed his mother’s heroic efforts to save him from drowning when he spoke to BBC’s Witness History the year of the commemoration.
“She carried me and tied me up in a shawl at the back so she had free hands and then slowly from the rope she came down to the lifeboat,” he said.
“They were allowing about 15 to 20 people and in the boat, there were some biscuits and some water.”
Meanwhile, Tej Prakash Mangat who was nine years old at the time explained how she felt the water rising against her legs before her father managed to take her to the safety of a life raft.
“I heard my father calling my name and then I felt the water everywhere and he said ‘Give me your hand’ and he lifted me up and took me to the lifeboat,” she said.
Rather than stay in safety with his daughter, Mangat’s father went back to look for her brothers and promised to return soon.
This was when the second torpedo struck the SS Tilawa.
“I saw that people were screaming and crying and I looked up at the ship, I was waiting for my father,” Mangat explained.
“It was a full moon when we heard a big bang. It was a second torpedo. I saw the black smoke and the ship sank.”
While her father managed to swim to the lifeboat after clinging to the railings of the sinking cruise liner, her brothers perished.
A commemoration event marking the 82nd anniversary of the tragedy will be held in Durban on November 23.
Meanwhile, a memorial was held in Bombay in 2022 on the 80th anniversary.
Instagram/@tilawa1942
sstilawa.com
English (US)