The best Westland Wapiti Indian scale model ever! PERIOD!..... BUT....

A couple of years ago, my friend Phil Camp posted photographs of a scratch built 1/48 scale Westland Wapiti IIa in 1930s Indian Air Force Colors. The model was built (by an unknown modeller) and displayed at the IPMS UK's Scale Model World event in 2011.  Its no wonder that this model won the Best Aircraft Award for that year.

The aircraft is an excellent example of attention to detail and ingenuity. The modeller displayed the aircraft with panels removed and with internal components visible.

The aircraft was displayed in the colors of No.1 Squadron, Indian Air Force. The Wapiti bore the serial K1263 and the Dark Blue/Light Blue chequer board markings on the fuselage and on the top of the wings. It featured the painted fin flash and the serial number. Two photographs exist of this Wapiti K1263 showing it being prepared for an operational sortie.  The accompanying plaque purports it to be of a Wapiti that served with the squadron at Drigh Road in the year 1934.

The model had photographs showing the various stage of scratch build process as well as the approach .

While there is no doubt that this is the best ever representaton of a Wapiti , and of one in Indian Air Force colours, and at that time I was totally in awe of the effort, I do in the interest of 'History' point out to a few inconsistencies. In the two years since this model appeared, I had attempted to write a history of the Westland Wapiti in Indian Air Force Service. After studying the records and archives available, and poring over more than a hundred photographs of Indian Air Force Wapitis, tracking the career of each individual aircraft over a decade, I found myself with a better understanding on the aircraft and the markings of the Indian units of that era. Without much ado, the inconsistencies are:

1. Wapiti K1263 did not serve at Drigh Road in 1934, but rather at Peshawar starting late 1936 and into 1937. At that time No.1 Squadron had 'A' Flight detached to No.20 Squadron RAF for operations in the NorthWest Frontier.  K1263 infact has the distinction of flying the first operational sortie when Flt Lt Awan flew a Pamphlet dropping mission in early 1937.
2. Though the aircraft features a 3 x 3 Checkerboard Square, Wapitis of that time had a 'wraparound' checker board marking that looks like a square from a distance but actually isn't. The following photograph shows the obvious difference where a small segment of a top row is visible.

   

   Photograph of K1263, of 'A' Flight, No.1 Squadron  (The Eagle Strikes)

3. As is visible in the photograph - the aircraft also featured a small "AC" superscript to the serial . This superscript is not on all the aircraft - and K1263 happened to be one such rare example.

As a fellow historian pointed out, the modeller may have been misled by the fact the aircraft had a fin flash painted.  RAF aircraft markings changed sometime in 1934 when the finflash was not painted on the aircraft - they featured plain tails. However many aircraft appeared to have continued in service with the fin flash painted on and K1263 retained its scheme well into 1937.

Ofcourse all this doesnt take away from the model - this post is only to highlight that new information surfaces all the time. What was not available in 2011 will now be on the record in 2013.  Future modellers will have this information to get the next ultimate variant of the Wapiti right!.

All photos of the model are courtesy of Phil Camp

A decal for a WW2 era RIAF Spitfire VIII

...or how your research benefits the (modeling) world at large ...(and in turn we benefit from it)

A friend of mine sent me a link to modeling website which released a new decal sheet for a Spitfire Mk.VIII. This sheet contains specific decals for an RIAF aircraft from No.2 Squadron , "MT841" and features a pin-up model. An accompanying 'guide' sheet shows how the Spitfire looks (See below right).

"Pauline My Wee xxxx" as the Pin-up goes was designed thanks to in no small measure to this photograph from late Fg Offr O D Agnihotri's Photo Collection (As generously shared by his son Arun on the Bharat Rakshak Website )

At that time (2004!), I had asked around on the KeyForums on whether an 'original drawing' was available of the pin-up.

Seven Years later, we now have a decal sheet by a model decal manufacturer... The enthusiasts with an Indian interest benefits out of this.. .. We, the research blokes get a 'colour artwork profile' of how the Spit Looks.. .. The RIAF gets a wee bit more publicity.... and.. Everyone benefits!

The Westland Lysander in India

Amazon Kindle e-books opens up some great possibilities of 'publishing' ebooks to niche audiences. One can get to write and publish stuff that normally would not get done so by traditional publishing houses - yet at the same time may hold the interest of the audience out there.

Kindle gives an opportunity to put these ebooks out for those who are interested. Now that they are not platform specific - they can be read not only on the Kindle, but also on iPads, iPods, PCs - it makes sense that this new market should be tapped. Two of my ebooks are out there now - Westland Lysanders of the Indian Air Force and Westland Lysanders of No.28 Squadron, RAF . Now if I can do the history of the aircraft with No.20 Sqn, RAF and No.357 Sqn RAF (whose ORBs incidentally are available at http://www.rquirk.com/357.html ), then I will have completed the history of one aircraft type in India across all squadrons! That would be something

Now regarding the interest these ebooks generate - surprisingly, the Lysanders in the IAF ebook has done well. and by well, sales are well into double figures :)

Review: For King and Another Country: An Amazing Life Story of an Indian WW2 RAF Fighter Pilot

Fighter Pilot Biographies are innumerable.. there are thousands of books out there dealing with the lives of World War Two era fliers. But try to locate anything specific to World War 2 pilots from India, and you will be hard pressed to locate one. In that context the availability of the biography of Squadron Leader Mahinder Singh Pujji DFC was welcome news. Sqn Ldr Pujji, till recently was one of the last remaining pilots still living from that era. Only 21 Indians ever received the DFC in the Second World War - and Pujji was the rare survivor among them. He had been in the news in recent years, highlighting the contributions of the Indian volunteers to the cause of the Allies. Thus a book that was to be his biography was a much awaited one. Sadly even as I was awaiting reciept of the book, news came in that Sqn Ldr Pujji had passed away in UK at the age of 92. The book arrived just a day after.

The title page of the book gives an idea on what the book is about - Below the main title "For King and Another Country : An amazing story of an Indian WW2 RAF Fighter Pilot" is another sub title - "Recollections of Squadron Leader Mahinder Singh Pujji as told to Graham Russell". This book is just that - Recollections of a ninety year old WW2 RAF Veteran. Unfortunately as many a historian will note - such recollections while welcome, are often cloudy, inaccurate and can muddle the waters. The Author Graham Russell writes in his introduction "A detailed inventory of the Second World War Operations he took part in will not be found in this book - that type belongs to a Pilots Logbook..."

There you have it, it just so happens that was exactly the information I was looking for in the book ... I suspect if this statement had been printed openly in any of the promotional material, there would have been a tad fewer sales than normal. Granted perhaps there is a market among schools as text book, but definitely the hardcore WW2 Aviation reader will surely be disappointed if he had any higher expectations.

Whats inside the book? Well for starters - its about 182 Pages in total. Remove the 10 pages of title, information and author's preface, and the 88 pages of copious illustrations, it leaves roughly 84 pages of text of Pujji's recollections. These 84 pages are equally split between his career before the end of the Second World War, and his career details after that. These 84 pages of text do make a significant contribution - in recording and immortalizing Pujji's words and memories. Certainly not much has been reported about Pujji's aviation career after WW2 and the book does make its contribution in that regard.

But all this doesn't shake off the disappointment of not learning about Pujji's war time operations in detail. While there are several anecdotes directly from Pujji, stories and memories of some of the sorties. The lack of dates and timeline is a distraction. It would have been good if the author had researched Pujjis' WW2 career and rightly annotated the information in sections. By not choosing to do so, the book introduces many inaccurate statements that may set the historian astray.

Among the errors that caught this reviewers eye - "Pujji applied for the RAF and was selected in it" (Pujji volunteered for the IAF - there are several key differences between an IAF commission and an RAF commission). "12 of Pujjis colleagues were killed in UK" (About 7 were killed - 1 died later in Australia). "Pujji Joined 6 Squadron under Sharp" (It was clear that Pujji was confusing his 4 Squadron tenure under Sqn Ldr G S Sharp RNZAF with that of his earlier 6 Squadron tenure under Sqn Ldr Mehar Singh). "CO Sharp went missing for months, Pujji took over command" (The ORBs of 4 Squadron indicated that Sharp went missing only for a week before news was telegraphed to the Squadron that He had been recovered, albeit slightly bruised. Moreover it was Flt Lt D M Finn and later P A Kennedy who assumed command of the Squadron). It was errors like this that distract away from the pages dealing with Second World War days.

Ofcourse I do understand the author's dilemma - how would you correct your subject's recollections knowing they are in error ? But in this case Graham Russell probably didn't know they were wrong in the first place.

The saving grace in the book - are the details of Pujjis life after the war. The photos that accompany the book could have been cut down in place of better researched text - but since the meat on the book is lacking, the additional photographs are a welcome addition.

In final summary, the book is a disappointment to any WW2 Aviation Researcher. Though it may be a good book for the novice reader who wants to learn about the Indian Contribution to the Second World War. In my personal opinion, this book rates two stars at best.

The Oldest Officer in the Indian Air Force - Gulmast Khan

We all know that the oldest officer at any point of time in the Indian Air Force is probably the Chief of Air Staff - who retires as soon as he reaches the age of 60. Additionally there could be a Master Warrant Officer who reaches his late 50s before he retires. There have been cases where personnel from the ranks were commissioned into the Officer stream - and some of them pretty late in their career. But most if not all would have retired before hitting the 60 year mark.

Enter the mysterious IND/1721 Flight Lieutnant Khan Bahadur Haji Gulmast Khan, commissioned into the Indian Air Force as a Pilot Officer on 10th October 1941. Gulmast Khan was among the first ever 200 officers in the air force, and was commissioned into the Administration Branch - then known as A&SD. What puts apart Gulmast from the others was that at the time of his commissioning, he was 59 years old! You see, Khan Bahadur Gulmast Khan was born on 1st May 1882!

Not much is known about Gulmast Khan. He seems to have served in the North West Frontier Province as much is known about him. The end of the Second World War found him on the strength of RAF Station Kohat - which at that time was the only RAF Station entirely staffed by Indian Officers. It was from this post that Gulmast Khan was demobilised. On 18th December 1946, Gulmast Khan was sent to No.1 Demobilisation Center at Lahore for release - at which point he was 64 years old!

Gulmast Khan, however, can only claim to be the IAF Officer with the oldest birthdate. The credit of being the oldest officer at the time of commissioning goes to IND/2112 Pilot Offr Edmund George Lazarus of the Signals Branch. Lazarus was born 14th Sept 1882 -- five and a half months after Gulmast. But Lazarus was commissioned as a Pilot Officer on 11th November 1942 - An year and a month after Gulmast Khan! Thus making him the oldest ever person to get a regular IAF Commission - at the ripe old age of 60 years and two months! (nearly). It is not know as to when Lazarus left the IAF.But he is noted as still serving as of October 1945.

No known photographs exist of either Gulmast or Lazarus - but it certainly makes an intriguing story to find out why and how they ended up getting commissioned in the Indian Air Force at such an advanced age. One can say for sure - that neither of these gentlemen will lose thier records in the near future!

Ten Years Old : The History of the Indian Air Force

This is the story of another find on ebay a couple of months ago. I recognised the cover straight away . It was a booklet published for the 10th year anniversary of the Indian Air Force. Infact in a very famous photograph showing the three Engineer Brothers (Below) Aspy Engineer is shown carrying copies of the booklet when he flew down to Risalpur for a reunion with his brothers - Minoo and Ronnie.

To cut a long story short, gotta have it, and yes, i did get it.

Its a 30 page booklet. With a sprinkling of photographs but mostly text oriented throughout. While most of the pictures have already been elsewhere, they appear to be printed with better quality in this booklet. Atleast one photograph was a first - dating from Oct 41 shows Sqn Ldr Majumdar escorting the Governor of NWFP at Peshawar during his inspection of No.1 Squadron. I havent seen it elsewhere.

Once again, I have to make a survey of known copies . One is certainly there at the British Library in the UK - Its record can be accessed here . Other copies? I am not so sure.

The "infamous" Burhan-ud-din of Chitral?

Among the various photos of No.1 Squadron, Indian Air Force from the late 30s, early 40s is this gentlemen - always wearing a uniform that is of a slightly different colour than the rest of the squadron - my take is that he is one of the Indian Army deputed officers who were part of the Squadron at that time. But there weren't many - D A R Nanda, Burhan-ud-din of Chitral, M K Janjua, M S Verdi, Jaswant Singh , Niranjan Prasad, P K Kuriyan and Asghar Khan are a few who are known.

This particular gentleman - I would tend to believe is the colourful Burhan-Ud-Din (spelled sometimes as Burhanuddin ) - later of INA infamy and the brother of the Mehtar of Chitral of that time.

Burhan-ud-din was originally commissioned into the Indian Army in 1935. After some time with the Baluch Regiment, he was one of the Army officers sent for flying training. He joined the IAF Squadron sometime in 1939 and remained with them till atleast January 1941.

The first assignment that Burhan was with the Squadron was to form part of the "Q" Flight - which was sent to Karachi for Coastal Defence Duties. Led by A B Awan, the Q Flight (Ex- A Flight) had Mehar Singh an S N Goyal with them as well.

The words "Colourful" "Infamous" etc are used in context with Burhan Ud Din's name is because he was a controversial figure. Quite a few used to look at him like an eccentric character. Air Vice Marshal Harjinder Singh has quite a few tales to tell of Burhan - one of which involved Burhanuddin requesting harjinder to teach him how to drive a car. As Harjinder recalls - Burhan-ud-din was an absolutely hopeless case as far as learning to drive a car was concerned. Flying an aircraft was much simpler for him - with the simple throttle and all. But to drive a manual transmission car which requires soem control over the Clutch, Burhan proved absolutely beyond help and infact ended up wrecking his car by reversing into a wall. That was the first time he discovered that his car had a reverse gear!

The 'princeling' from Chitral - as Harjinder puts it - was the 'most eccentric of them all'. He always talked ill of his brother - the Mehtar, and once told Harjinder that he expected his brother to either kill him or imprison him whenever he visited Chitral on his days off. It is said that any ruler of Chitral would feel unimportant if he was not killed by a relative when in power ! Burhan Ud Din ofcourse belonged to the same clan and had his own fears! He was also a suave player - During the Q Flight detachment, Burhan-ud-din worked himself into the Station Commanders inner circle and would get invited to any social event that was there - many times missing out on his duty pilot requirements. Leaving a very frustrated Flight Commander (Awan) stepping in to fill the void!

The harshest critcism comes from Air Marshal Aspy Engineer who would write in 1993 :

Then there were some people who never should have joined any air-force. As the detachment commander at Miranshah, I had the misfortune to have a new posting. I will call him Burhan. Son of a petty chieftain from way up north, he first joined the army but one mess night he threatened to shoot his C.O. after the latter had remonstrated that Burhan’s two dogs would not let him enter the building. Burhan promptly retorted, “Sir, you shoot my dogs and I will shoot you.” Well, that is how I had him in my unit. To cut several hair-raising stories short, I had his pet wolf shot, as the only humane option left after the wolf had severed his tongue by trying to chew through a Wapiti’s spare main plane. So glad to inform you that I am still alive in 1993.

I personally heard from another of Burhan-Ud-Din's peers - Air Vice Marshal Surendranath Goyal, was a Cranwell Trainee from 1938, spent time in the NWFP with No.1 Squadron. He remembered Burhan-Ud-Din to be a great friend of his - but also expressed his dissappointment at the brutality shown by Burhan when he was with the Indian National Army in 1945. As late as Jan 41, Burhanuddin was still with No.1 Squadron as a Fg Offr. One of the above photographs is probably of him during a detachment at Fort Sandeman at that time. Prior to that there is a record of him being with the Squadron in July 40.

Burhan went back to his Baluch Regiment duties sometime in 1941 and was taken POW on the fall of Singapore. He would later join the Indian National Army under Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. Burhan Ud Din's actions as an INA Officer were unofficerlike , he ordered several deserters to be flogged without due process - and one of the soldiers died. For this he received quite a bit of attention in most books dealing with the INA Trails. He was supposed to be the first one to be put on trial - but instead Shah Nawaz, Dhillon and Sehgal went up for trial.

Burhan-ud-din was ultimately tried in a Military Court - presided by then Brigadier K M "Kipper" Cariappa - later CinC Indian Army. Cariappa's court sentenced Burhan to seven years rigorous imprisonment . Popular anecdotes recall - that after sentencing him to imprisonment, Kipper walked over and shook hands with him, raising eyebrows among many.

Burhan-ud-din was released on Independence and went back to Chitral. He was supposed to have been quite active during the 47-48 Operations in organising the fighting at Skardu and Zoji La. He then went back to his chieftain days in Chitral till supposedly committing suicide in 1995. As I said, a colourful and infamous figure.

Be that as it may, the early Muslim aviators who were part of No.1 Squadron - like A B Awan, Haider Raza, Burhan-Ud-din appear to have absolutely loved their unit. The link above mentions Burhan-Ud-din signing his name in the guestbook of a PAF Station as "Lt Burhan-Ud-din , 1 Squadron, Indian Air Force!" less than a month after end of hostilities between India and Pakistan!. We know that Haider Raza's Grave Marker too makes an association with the Undividied "Royal Indian Air Force" - even though he served as the Vice Chief of the Pakistan Air Force. These folks absolutely loved their time with the WW2 RIAF.

Sometimes I feel it is a bloody tragedy for the airforce to split.. (But only sometimes... not all the time!)

The Royal Indian Air Force at War : An account of Air Operations in South-East Asia

This has to be the most expensive book that I ever bought, atleast in terms of Rupees per Cubic cm of volume!. But well worth it. Published in 1946 by the Directorate of Public Relations, the book is a pinbound volume with about 120 pages of text and photos. Colour plates showcase water color paintings by Henry Sheldon.

Among my collector friends (some of them with very deep pockets) , no one has a copy. So I solemnly declare that this is the only copy known to be in the wild. Even USI is said to have only a photocopy.

I am listing the copies with other Libraries here. Let me know if you run into any stashed away anywhere.

Oh btw. I owe you one - eBay!

Catalogue Searches: (Zero, Zilch, Nada)
Amazon.com : Not Listed , Amazon.co.uk : 0 , Amazon.ca : Not Listed , Abebooks : 0 , Bookfinder : 0 , WorldCat.org : 0

Known Copies:

1. Library of Congress, Washington DC, USA http://lccn.loc.gov/47022977

2. British Library, UK Link

3. Imperial War Museum Collection, UK Link

Let me know if you find more

30 November 2013 Update : Roughly four years after i made the above post, I am glad to mention that a SECOND copy of the above book has been spotted in the wild - in the hands of another Indian Aviation Enthusiast. Vinayak Dutt Shukla has one copy in his collection too - and he sends proof!  Its actually in better condition than my copy..

Congratualations on the great acquisition - Now guard it with your life VDS!

The Brewster Buffalo and the Indian Air Force

Years ago,I read suggestions that Brewster Buffalos may have served with the IAF (Dan Ford's Warbird Forum) and one example was transferred to the IAF (Joe Baugher) etc. I used to laugh at that suggestion. I was pretty damn sure that the Buffalo never served with the Indian Air Force. But if you ask me today, I am not laughing! The reason, I was emailed some a couple of scans of late Squadron Leader Jehangir Merwan Engineer's logbook last year from his daughter - Mrs Farida Engineer. The logbook discloses that between May and July 43, He served with No.22 Anti Aircraft Cooperation Unit ( a composite RAF/IAF Unit ). (No.22AACU Was formed as an RAF unit out of IAF Anti Aircraft Coop Flights - It was later transferred to the Indian Air Force and became the No.22 AACU, IAF.) .

Right among the list of types he flew during his stint were two Brewster Buffalos! The first ever record that established Indian pilots flew Buffalos with what was later an IAF unit. The Buffalos in question are W8243 and W8245 (Profiles and Pictures above). I note from elsewhere on Dan Ford's Board that these are two of the six Buffalos that were flown back by 67 RAF sqn from the Burma Retreat. it appears these two aircraft were transferred to No.22 Anti Aircraft Cooperation Unit's A flight in Karachi Drigh Road at beginning of 1943 and were flown by Indian pilots later on. I also noticed that the fate of these two aircraft was marked as unknown in the production list available on other sites and books. if anyone is updating their lists, they can add No.22 AACU andthe period May -July 43 for these two aircraft.

New Garden Airport Airshow

While going through a free newspaper about local news - i picked up at the groceries store, I was surprised to find an ad about an "Air Show!" . What?? an airshow close to home?? turns out that the New Garden Airport at Toughkenemon, PA has an annual airshow. a small affair, but a regular one.

Having an airshow close to home - I just had to haul my ass off to watch it - and i did. the airport was a cute place - single runway - lot of gen av aircraft. the arrangement was such that you could literally sit about 50 - 100 feet away from the runway threshold and take pictures. The aircraft actually come into land flying just above the parking lot. So I had some wonderful shots. Some of the best i have taken (Beating even the WW2 reading ones)

More of the photos at this link