LACADIVES

Lacadives brings 25 years of SCUBA diving expertise and passion to your doorstep. Led by a team of experienced, professional dive instructors and dive masters, Lacadives has trained over five thousand divers and hosted thousands of certified divers from across the globe. We set up India’s first dive school on Kadmat, in the Lakshadweep (which we lovingly called the ‘jetty at the end of the universe’ – because that is what it was!) in 1995. Since then, we moved to the Andamans, and currently have two dive centers - in Chidiyatapu, South Andaman, and at the Taj Exotica Resort & Spa on Havelock Island. We also offer confined water and theory sessions in selected swimming pools in Mumbai, and conduct staff-accompanied trips to dive destinations around the world.

We’ve been around a while - our years of experience and exposure enable us to cater to a spectrum of diver skill levels. The years have also provided us with a sense of responsibility for our planet’s health and the fragile marine ecosystems that become our transient homes. We are dedicated to building an embankment of underwater memories for our clients, and we strive to do so by deeply respecting the environment and communities within which we operate, because Lacadives would not exist without them. To experience and share the enchantment of the underwater universe is a privilege, and one that we do not take for granted. For as long as we have been diving, we have been educating. Reefwatch Marine Conservation and Lacadives jointly engage divers and the immediate communities in the islands with marine biodiversity and conservation. We conduct marine ecology programs with schools across India, provide diving experiences to school children in Chidiyatapu and offer dive naturalist courses, which provide a more intensive exploration of marine biology than that provided by regular SCUBA diving.

OUR HISTORY 

Founded by one of India's leading ad-film makers, Prahlad Kakar, Lacadives is India's first SCUBA diving company. In 1995, Prahlad Kakar had an experience which he describes as “the nearest to spirituality [he] ever got”. On his first dive in Mauritius, he found an old Koran lying on the coral reef. That mesmerizing first dive led to Lacadives, India’s first diving company, on the island of Kadmat, in the iridescent Lakshadweep island archipelago. The rest is history. At the time, the SCUBA Instructor team was assembled under CMAS (Confederation Mondiale des Activites Subaquatiques), a French federation that oversees SCUBA diver certification. Later, we began offering PADI certifications. Since 1995, we’ve had dive schools in the Lakshadweep and in the Andamans – Havelock, Wandhoor and Chidiya Tapu, our current location. Just recently, we went back to Havelock and started an in house dive center at the Taj Exotica Resort and Spa. We have also led trips around the world – to see schooling hammerheads in the Galapagos Islands in Ecuador, experience the pristine beauty of Raja Ampat in Indonesia and to swim alongside giant mantas in the Maldives. Over these two decades, we have built a global fraternity of kindred spirits comprising the thousands  of divers we’ve certified and hosted, and who love the ocean as  we do. We receive multiple messages – sometimes several a day – about diving in the Lakshadweep. Government restrictions have prevented us, as a private operator, from continuing operations there. But the moment the tides turn, we’ll be back where we started! And you’ll be the first to know – but until then, come pay us a visit in our little spot in the sun in the Andamans. We would  love to have you!

Our Centres-

1. HAVELOCK ISLAND, ANDAMAN & NICOBAR ISLAND (Click Here)

2. MUMBAI (Click Here)