The fate of Squadron Leader Vinod Sehgal (R.I.P.1962) now resolved

Squadron Leader Vinod Sehgal is the only Indian Air Force casualty of the 1962 war. He is believed killed and there has always been some mystery about his actual fate. especially as photograph of his helicopter had surfaced that showed it intact and being examined by the Chinese. The photo is reproduced in Air Marshal Bharat Kumars book on the 62 war. (and in the below post)

It was believed  that Sqn Ldr Sehgal and his passenger Major Ram Singh were either killed on landing or were taken POW and later killed.

Even the 62 war book ("Unknown and Unsung") remains ambiguous about what actually happened. 

The answer may have been right under our noses.    This document http://www.scribd.com/doc/3190762/Artillery-Support-to-7-infantry-Brigade- is a first person account by then 2nd Lt A S Behl (later Brigadier).  This was published in 2008 and linked from the Report My Signal Blog  (http://reportmysignal.blogspot.com/2008/06/indo-china-war-tsangdhar-20-oct-1962.html )

He writes

"We saw a helicopter approaching the helipad. By that time small arm fire had also started from the black rock area and shelling was also going on.There was no sign of the helicopter taking-off again. I sent a patrol of two men to see what had happened. They came back and told me that that the helicopter was there, and two persons; one pilot and another person in a redturban were lying dead near the helicopter. Next day, when we buried them as prisoners of war (POWs) I could identify one as Sqn Ldr Sehgal and theother as Maj Ram Singh of Signals."

And there it is - an account by an Indian Army Officer as to what the actual fate of Sqn Ldr Sehgal is. I cannot recollect if Tsangdhar is actually in Indian territory or not, but perhaps an effort can be made to commemorate the graves .

Reproduced below is the photograph and the original caption speculating about the fate

ABOVE: In this rare screen capture from a Chinese News Film, Sqn Ldr Vinod Sehgal's helicopter is shown at the Tsangdhar Helipad in Chinese Hands. The close up shot shows the serial as BZ-543. Sqn Ldr Sehgal (right) was presumably killed after he made the landing. The Helicopter was not returned by the Chinese after the war.

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!

If you go looking for IAF History, you will find it...

...Pennsylvania edition....

Watch in HD

Visitor's to the Mid-Atlantic Aviation Museum's yearly "World War Two Weekend" event would never guess that one of the Star attractions - an airworthy Supermarine Spitfire Mk XVIII (S No SM969) is an ex-Indian Air Force aircraft. The aircraft was flown in by its owner Jim Beasley, and gave an splendid display of aerobatics. This Spitfire is local to Pennsylvania, with its homebase at Coatesville. In a departure from other aircraft, this aircraft was displayed without any ropes cordoning it off.. so visitors could walk straight upto the aircraft, look inside the cockpit, see it ..up CLOSE..

I had captured the start up and taxing on High Definition Video, which can be seen above. Hit the maximise button to see it in all its glory. Watching an ex-IAF Spitfire made my day - and a photo of myself next to it is my now official mugshot on facebook!.

Spitfire SM969 started off with the IAF as HS877 in 1949 (there is a story about it serving in the RIAF Before and getting involved in an accident.. but are now easily disproven). Probably towards the end of 1957, When No.14 Squadron was converting to Hunters and got rid of the Spitfires, this aircraft was flown to Delhi and kept on (semi) permanent display at Western Air Command HQ.

Pic Copyright: Peter Arnold

In 1978, it was one of the numerous Spitfire airframes auctioned off to the West, it was recovered by Haydon-Baylie, and after numerous stops and owners, is currently owned by Jim Beasley Jr , a Vintage aircraft fanatic from Philadelphia - who flies a P-51 and now the Spitfire. (Just in case you were wondering, Jim Beasley is an Attorney, a Medical Doctor and accomplished "Super Lawyer in PA)...

The Spitfire is based out of the airfield at Coatesville, PA, at the Chester County Airport. Thats reason for me to file this post under the "If you go looking for IAF History, you will find it... PA edition".

Hand Crafted RIAF Toy figures - Shamus Wade

Normally I would go after any curio sold on ebay that has some connection to the Indian Air Force. Imagine my surprise when an item was listed - titled "Nostalgia / Ookjah Privy by Shamus Wade - Indian Air Force" was listed by an ebay seller hobo2150.

Description given as follows:

INDIAN AIR FORCE PERSONNEL - from the companion range "Oojah cum Pivy"
5 Figures beautifully hand painted
2 x Pilots
3 x Ground crew

A great set for your collection very unusual subject and very scarce dating from 1984/5
A set of figures modelled from a photograph of Indian Airforce personnel and intended to be grouped around an aircraft which some of the figures are posed leaning against. Comes with an explanatory biography sheet of each of the figure represensted and is still in Shamus Wade's original packing box (these sets came without a presentation/disply box. Some figures have very minor paint chips from storage, but have never ben displayed so their colours are still bright and
glossy.

The five "Indian Air Force" figurines , it turns out were based on a famous Second World War photograph of a Vengeance Crew from No.7 Squadron No.8 Squadron. The photograph (reproduced below from "The Eagle Strikes" shows Flt Lt Haveli Shah Chopra (one of the RAF 24) and his Gunner Fg Offr P J Chandran leaning against a Vengeance. They are flanked by three airmen/ground crew Zahir-ud-din, Mathews and Veliram. Shamus Wade took this photograph and modelled their figurines .


.
Anyways - If I had any thoughts of grabbing this set, I may well have not bothered. When bidding ended on 17th October 2010, the figurines sold for US $125! - five toy figurines - for 125 bucks!..four bidders got into a bidding war ... I must have missed the memo somewhere.

Turns out that Shamus Wade (Company?) was quite famous for its toy soldier figures. Focussing on obscure and exotic subjects - the range of figurines have a strong following. There was no way that I get it as to why they went for such an astronomical figure. With passionate collectors out there I dont think I will even bother the next time.

Update:2 Jan 2011: Towards the last week of December, another set came up on sale on Ebay. The Seller from UK was rather too smart - he broke up the set and sold them individually - piece by piece.. and the bidding went upto 83.12 GBP for the five figures (plus postage)!. Thats $129.80.. beating the previous auction by $4!

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!

65 Air War Mysteries : The Hunter vs the Starfighter

Its almost five years since the "India-Pakistan Air War of 1965" was published - At that time we had done our best to research most of the facts and stories of the 65 War. We interviewed veterans, procured official records and reports and squeezed whatever information we could to the best of our abilities. We tried meticulously to compare accounts from either side, and to resolve differences in accounts.

However despite all our efforts, we still come across stories that fascinate us, or those tales that we have not been able to resolve. These are what I call 'Mysteries' of the 65 Air War.

Five years on , a couple of these gaps have been filled but most remain so. In a series of posts, I will list out the stories and mysteries that either still require solving or have been solved in these recent years.

The Hunter Vs the Starfighter:

A very fascinating story was narrated by Fricker in his book - about an aircombat between a Pakistani Starfighter and an Indian Hunter. The fight started on an unspecified date, when two F-104s scrambled and visually identified two Hunters ahead of them. Fricker continues the story:

..No.2 Flt Lt Arif Manzoor, picked up the two Hunters on his radar and took the lead. As he began overtaking the Hunters at Mach 0.85, both IAF aircraft broke left, possibly warned by Amritsar Radar.

One Hunter rolled over on its back and pulled through in a split-S manoeuvre, while the other turned so tightly during its break that Flt Lt Manzoor saw it stall and pitch up no fewer than three times. By then the F-104s had been seperated, but Flt Lt Manzoor stayed with the second Hunter, hoping to release a Sidewinder as soon as it became possible to relax the amount of g being pulled in the turn. In th emeantime, he also endeavoured to close the range of the Hunter so that he can use the Vulcan cannon. At about 5000 feet distance, he laid his computing gunsight ahead of the Hunter, but found the target sliding up his windscreen as the IAF aircraft tightened its turn still further.

As he racked the Stargihter round as tightly as possible, Flt Lt Manzoor opened up power to keep his speed above about Mach 0.9, He was therefore unworried about being intercepted in turn despite warnings from his No.1 of other enemy aircraft in the vicinity.

In all, the F-104 made four attempts to nail the determined adversary, but each time the Hunter was able to out-turn the Starfighter, although it stalled out twice more in the process. . Eventually Flt Lt Manzoor realised that the situation was a stalemate.... disengaged by zooming up in afterburner....

...This degree of flying skill was not often demonstrated by the pilots of the IAF....."

It is surprising that Fricker didnt pin a date on this aircombat, even though it is said to be one of the only eight aerial encounters of this type. All the other seven encounters get a date with the exception of this one.

Ofcourse, neither could we figure out the story from the Indian side. Certainly the Battle Axe History does not mention any such encounter. The only other possibility may be 27 Squadron, but no accounts or corraboration appeared from that side as well.

Identifying this Hunter pilot shouldnt be a difficult task. With only 2.5 Squadrons of Hunters taking part, there wouldnt be more than 45 - 50 Hunter pilots who may have taken part in offensive ops. How many of these actually reported encountering a PAF fighter in air combat? There must be some operational report somewhere!

The task would actually be easier if any interprid Pakistani Historian can nail the date of the encounter by referring to the logbook of Arif Manzoor. But apparently Arif Manzoor had passed away long ago. That shouldn't stop anyone from trying to find out more about this combat.

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 one that got away (on eBay) (RAF Album)

On the outside it looked like a regular old family photo album. The pages inside reflected a tour of duty of some Royal Air Force airman in the hostile and dusty North West Frontier Province area of Undivided India. I stumbled onto the Album in an auction on eBay.

The contents of the album were mostly the sights of the NWFP - places like Peshawar, Kohat, Lower Topa find mention. Some are Aerial shots, others are on the ground. Of people, of cattle and the sights. These were interspersed with the odd RAF aircraft photographs. This was what caught my interest.

The Upper Left photo shows a pranged Westland Wapiti with the caption "An Error of Judgement" - The Wapiti K1294 appears to belong to No.5 Squadron RAF - as indcated by the white fuselage band around the rear part of the aircraft. Other photographs in the series also showed a colour print of "HMT Dunera", "S O P Farnborough 1934" and a photograph titled "Lower Topa". HMT Dunera apparently began its career in 1937 and this sort of gives us a timeframe for the Album. The name of the ship sounded familiar - later I realised that it was the same ship in which Fg Offr Balan Dandapani, a WW2 Veteran that I interviewed in 2007, travelled as part of the British Commonwealth Occupational Foces in Japan.

It was the next series of photographs that made me stand up. In the lower right, was the picture of a Westland Wapiti in flight. What sets this one apart was the chequerboard fuselage marking - a marking sported only by the aircraft of No.1 Squadron, Indian Air Force. I do not ever recall seeing this particular picture - and is probably one of the very rare few of an IAF Wapiti in Flight.

The next page had a very interesting color drawing - the official crest of Aircraft Depot Karachi. Again, most certainly a post 1937 development. This figures in with above as the IAF unit was initially based at Drigh Road, where the Aircraft Depot was. Other shots include aerial views of Karachi and Manora, Kohat, Peshawar, Lahore etc.

The Auction was ultimately won by an anonymous bidder. I never had the deep pockets to even mount a credible counter bid. It did however open up my eyes about the gems that you can find on Ebay. Infact an year later, There was similar album on sale. Again, I lost the bid. But fortunately the winner was gracious enough to share his spoils for which I am always grateful. The results are there on the BR Site.

Ofcourse the question still unanswered - where is this album now? If you are the owner and you are reading this, why not drop in a comment ?

Flight of the Falcon

Flight of the Falcon is the autobiography of Air Commodore S Sajad Haider, PAF. The copy I bought was delivered today. Wow what a book! - long overdue and something that definitely needed to be written from the Pakistani side for decades. The book's 65 air war chapter quotes extensively from our own air war book on 65, and it is almost inevitable for me that I have to read it side by side with IPAW65 (and an excuse for my tattered copy to form the background in this photo).

The book offers the first critical look at the PAF's role in 65 and offers a honest and dispassionate look at the PAF planning and claims. There are some great stories about 71 too. It would take too long for me to write all about it.. but in short.. go out and buy this book - its money well spent.

The Indian Aviation Library (Updated)

Not the whole collection - There are a few more books to be bought and procured. This is from last year. The earlier post which is similar is two years old. Will update a photo from this year shortly as I got yet another half a dozen new books including the elusive "Touching the Sky" Coffee table book.

Book Review: PAF Bomber Operations in the 1965 and 1971 Wars

This book has been described elsewhere as "a Lively first person account of B-57 operations by a PAF officer" and I tend to agree with that statement.


First about the scope of this book - Contrary to the title, which tends to raise expectations among history buffs like me, the book is about the personal experiences of Air Cmde Rais Rafi (Retd-PAF). who has been in the thick of action in both wars flying missions in B-57 bombers. Rais Rafi was one of the two Squadron Commanders from the 65 war, the other being Air Commodore Najib Khan. Being the Squadron CO, Rafi is in a good position to give a blow by blow account of the operations that he was involved in.


Expectedly, the book provides a very in-depth minute by minute coverage of the missions flown by him and his compatriots. While most of the major events are covered, a few of the events from the perspective of his compatriots are missed out. Since Rafi was based at Mauripur at the start of the 65 war, the focus is on ops from Mauripur which are well covered. there is not enough info on the initial and later ops of the B-57s from Peshawar. Especially the effective raids on Adampur on the evening of Sept 6th.


The coverage of the war improves towards the latter days. The narration is interspersed with profiles of notable B-57 pilots in the PAF, along with their photographs and the details of the actions. There are several snippets of information related to the B-57 tactics that one finds useful. In no particular order


1. The B-57s used their RB1A all weather radar to map the terrain. key features like bridges clearly showed up on the radar screen . This explains their relative effectiveness as compared to the Indian Canberras in 65.

2. The B-57s used skip bombing techniques at Ambala during 65, one of which resulted in the bomb bouncing off and hitting the Cathedral near the airfield.

3. The ac used the wing mounted guns liberally.. i.e use them to strafe airfields once in a while - not just drop bombs.

4. bomb dropping is done by 'punching a clock' - reference to some bombing computer? on most occasions it appears the pilot would release the bombs manually, but the calculations are done by this onboard computer.

5. Nice insight is given into the B-57 shot down over Adampur on Sept 14 . It appears that the crew (Altaf Sheikh and Bashir Choudhary) pushed their luck by making multiple attacks on the airfield on the same sortie - the guns finding their mark on the fourth pass. Though nothing is mentioned about the travails of both the airmen on the ground - they were nearly lynched by the Punjab farmers - a very nice anecdote is given on their repatriation and the stark contrast on how they were received in Pakistan versus the reception Indian POWs got on their repatriation in India.



The three PAF POWs look on as the Indian POWs get a grand reception in Delhi on their repatriation


The book draft was probably finalised in 1989, but it could have benefited from some updating. For example, the author believes that the B-57 lost at Jamnagar crashed into the Sea due to disorientation of the pilot - Rafi was exiting out of the Jamnagar flying area when the ill-fated B-57 was coming in. This information of it crashing in sea could easily have been corrected as enough evidence existed even in 65 that it crashed on land. Several artifacts were salvaged from the crash site by the Indian government - most notably a page from the diary of the pilot.


The B-57 force was somewhat reduced by the time of the 71 war and it now comprised only one Squadron (No.8 PAF). They operated initially out of Mauripur and later moved up north. As with the 65 War narration, the coverage of Rafi's personal sorties are covered in great depth. He describes in good detail the launch of attacks on Ambala and Agra on the first day. Amritsar on the second day etc. However the details of many other important B-57 missions are missing - including the mission details on which B57 losses have occurred. Most get only a cursory mention - eg ' a B-57 was lost in the south today'. It is slightly disappointing to note that after describing the 65 losses in great detail, he is unable to do the same about 71.


Rafi's last Sorties were done on 8 Dec so not much is written about other operations till the rest of the war. Absolutely very little info exist on the operations in the southern sector. Details of Mauripur's B57 force do not get any space here - but that is expected because this is a personal account.


Other interesting facts that come out of the book -


-Rafi confirms the presence of atleast one B-57 at Rafiqui on the morning of Dec 4th. This was a mystery before as Air Marshal VK "Jimmy" Bhatia's article mentions seeing a B-57 at Rafiqui, while the Pakistani contention was always that B-57s were not based at Rafiqui. The book gives in details the a B57 ended up at Rafqiui on that day. and says it was flown out the next morning. - A nice description of the aftermath of the "Steel Tripod" attack done by Wg Cdr Gautam of No.16 Squadron on Mianwali. The raid was a surprise to the Pakistanis - it created no damage but was of some nuisance. The date however appears to be wrong (Night of Dec 3/4 instead of Dec 4/5)

-Rafi talks about the destruction of a B-57 on the ground at Mianwali - and attributes it to a Hunter attack. Previously the PAF had mentioned that this aircraft was lost on the ground during a servicing accident in which it caught fire. This is a revelation. Rafi also claims that the Hunter that attacked the airfield and caused the damage was shot down by Flt Lt Qazi Ahmed Javed. however this claim is not present for this date in the PAF list but is actually on Dec 4. Did he mix up some dates and places? This definitely needs further research. And having seen the number of things that Rafi actually got wrong, I wouldnt pin much hopes of him being correct on this front either.



With the scale down of operations after 8th December and the subsequent 'march to surrender' - Rafi writes considerably about the anguish felt by him and his fellow pilots. Till the very last moment they felt they could make a difference - perhaps 'secure a ceasefire on more honoroble terms'. But as we know they never got that opportunity to try.

The copy I have seems to have the quality of a good photocopy. In fact it looks like a "second edition" that was made up of binding photocopies. The book has no ISBN, which would mean its market is limited - major stores many not carry it. I got my copy via seller ehjaz786 on ebay.com . He just might have more copies with him. If your focus is air wars of the subcontinent, your library should have this interesting addition!

Post Script: This review was done months ago - based on one of my posts at ACIG/Warbirds Forum, but posted only now. The Author Air Cmde Rafi passed away early this year in Pakistan.

A spanking new Sukhoi-7 BMK

A pretty rare colour photograph of a Sukhoi-7BMK in IAF Markings, in natural metal finish without an ounce of camoflage paint on it!

Six and a half squadrons flew this aircraft during the 1971 War, and more than a Squadron's worth were lost in the operations - Aerial Combat, Ground Fire, Accidents.

What is unusual in this photograph is the lack of tail number on the aircraft. The roundel on the front fuselage confirms that this is not an early model but probably one of the batch that was delivered after 1969.

I dont know the source of this colour photograph other than that it appeared in one of the Air Enthusiast series of magazines. It is also on the cover of Puspindar Singh's "Aircraft of the Indian Air Force 1933-73" - thus one can safely assume that this photo predates that book. Air to Air Colour photographs from the 60s are almost non-existant and the origin of this photo is a mystery to say the least.

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.

Books I should have reviewed but didnt

I always appreciate a book that I enjoyed reading . And after every good book I read, I promise myself that I will write a few words or even review it on my website - but usually never ever came around to doing so.

I wrote some basic reviews on Amazon for a few - including Mansoor Shah's Gold Bird, Peter Smith's Vultee Vengeance, Roopinder Singh's Arjan Singh, but there are still a lot more great books that I have read over time that I didnt write about. (Yes I have written about YEAGER! - but that was more of a rant than a review!)

Without further ado - the books that I should review in detail .. at the earliest! (In no particular order)

1. The Incredible War - Air Marshal Bharat Kumar
2. Himalayan Eagles - Pushpindar Singh
3. Battle for Pakistan - John Fricker
4. The India-Pakistan Air War of 1965 - Yours truly and Samir Chopra

The first two are fairly recent. Frickers book is now three decades old, but still a great read if you know what you are looking for. the last one is my own book - its been five years since its final draft, and with loads of research work in between, there are lot of criticisms that I have about it. well.. some day!