Page 110 - Leadership in the Indian Army

matriculated in 1923. Thorat then joined the New Poona College, which
was later renamed Sir Parshuram Bhau College.
The Thorat family had not thought of a military career for the young lad.

However, just three years earlier, the first batch of Indian cadets had gone to
Sandhurst and this had opened up a new avenue for aspiring young men.
Thorat decided to try his luck and applied, after having deposited the
requisite fee of Rs 20,000 to cover the cost of his education and leave
expenses. The selection procedure was very stringent and after an initial
screening by the provincial governors, only 10 candidates from the whole
of India and Burma were allowed to take the written examination held in

Simla. This was followed by a series of interviews, beginning with a
selection board. After being cleared by it, Thorat was interviewed by the C-
in-C, Field Marshal Sir William Birdwood. His final interview was with
Lord Reading, the Viceroy of India, and Thorat was so overawed that he
addressed him as ‘Your Majesty’. Lord Reading rarely smiled, but this time
he did. At the end of the interview, he shook hands with Thorat, saying that

he hoped Thorat would make a good officer.
Thorat was one of five boys selected for admission to the Royal Military
College, Sandhurst, the others being Digamber Singh Brar, Gurbachan
Singh Bhagowal, Agha Mahmood Raza and H.A. Francis. All five sailed
from Bombay in December 1924, aboard the P&O liner Caledonia, and
reached England after a voyage lasting 14 days. They joined Sandhurst in
January 1925, to commence the first of their three terms of training.

Thimayya and Thapar were already there, having joined six months earlier.
Rajendra Sinhji and Thakur Nathu Singh had passed out earlier, in 1921 and
1923 respectively, while Cariappa had been commissioned after passing out
from the Cadet College at Indore in December 1919. Thorat found himself
in the same company as Thimayya, and this was the beginning of a lifelong
friendship and close association between the two.

Unlike Thimayya, who had been educated in a public school, Thorat had
never mixed with Europeans before, and initially suffered from an
inferiority complex. But thanks to his prowess with the rifle and in the
saddle, he soon overcame his diffidence. He did well in musketry and was
one of the 12 cadets graded as ‘marksmen’, which entitled him to wear the
coveted ‘marksman’ badge on the sleeve of his uniform. He also excelled in
equitation and was awarded his ‘spurs’ during the first term itself, a rare

feat in those days. These awards earned him the respect of his British