Indian Air Force Museum, Palam

My friend Dr. Shahjahan Avadi, an Air Force veteran and Disaster Management professional has been instrumental in bringing the Air Force Museum into the heritage-walk calendar of INTACH. While I couldn’t attend his previous walks, I did manage to attend the one he organized this Sunday.

The Air Force museum contrary to my expectation, had an impressive footfall during the three hours we spent there. While the building and the curation had pre-historic vibes, I was happy to learn that the entire complex is being relocated to a new dedicated building in Palam itself. This is something to look forward to since some of the newest museums of India have been impressive – the Humayun’s Tomb Museum, the Pradhan Mantri Sangralaya, the Rashtrapati Bhavan museum and the Partition Museum in Amritsar are some excellent ones that fall in this category.

My knowledge of the Indian Air Force has always been rudimentary and patchy. So the walk provided some important context. The force was established by the British in 1932 in anticipation of the requirements that the Empire might throw up. Even before 1932, the royalty of Patiala and Hyderabad did have private aircrafts. Delivering mail across vast swathes of the country in a time bound manner was also another reason for the initial expansion of aviation in India.

The walk, as expected covered the key air-operations of the IAF right from WWII, the 1947 Kashmir war and the battles that we fought with Pakistan in ’65, ’71 and ’99. For me, Nirmal Jit Singh Sekhon, the only Param Vir Chakra awardee of the IAF was the star of the museum. His exploits against Pakistan in the ’71 war was moving to hear. Apparently his role was essayed by Diljit Dosanjh in Border 2. (Now I have a reason to check out the movie. Incidentally, the Battle of Longewala which was the basis for the prequel was also displayed with some rudimentary papier-mâché stuff in the museum). Shahjahan also spent considerable time discussing the IPKF operations in Sri Lanka, Operation Cactus and the mechanics of ejection seats and the dangers associated with ejection.

The practice of air-dropping live animals to distant field locations was something that I never knew about (Meat on Hoof is the term for it). One of the major blemishes in the Indian Air Force’s record has been its deployment to bomb Indian civilians. This was in Mizoram in 1966 during the peak of the insurgency. Kudos to Shahjahan for not shirking away from this piece of history.

And now for some Mahabharata trivia: After seeing Krishna’s Vishwaroopam in the Kurukshetra battlefield, an awestruck Arjuna mouths the verse: नभःस्पृशं दीप्तमनेकवर्णम् (Nabhah Sparsham Diptam which translates to Radiant, touching the sky, multi-colored or in simple terms ‘Touch the Sky with Glory’ ). This becomes the motto of the Indian Air Force.