The daughter of one of many nation’s high fighter pilots has joined the Indian Air Power’s fighter stream, and can quickly head for additional coaching at a premier airbase within the japanese sector that was earlier commanded by her father, a serving air commodore — a uncommon prevalence within the air drive that opened the fighter stream to ladies solely eight years in the past, officers conscious of the matter mentioned on Wednesday.
Muskaan Singh, 24, has been commissioned as a flying officer within the IAF. Her father Air Commodore Ran Singh holds a key publish within the Air Headquarters in Delhi. She was among the many 204 cadets (together with 5 ladies assigned to the fighter stream) who graduated from the elite Air Power Academy (AFA), Dundigal, Hyderabad, on December 14 after the profitable fruits of their pre-commissioning coaching within the flying and floor obligation branches of the IAF, the world’s fourth largest air drive.
There have been a number of cases of fathers and sons becoming a member of the fighter stream, however the Singhs are the second identified case of a father-daughter fighter pilot pair within the air drive, mentioned one of many officers cited above, asking to not be named. Muskaan is a third-generation navy officer — her grandfather served within the military. The household hails from Haryana’s Bhiwani district.
In 2022, fighter pilots Air Commodore Sanjay Sharma and Flying Officer Ananya cemented their place within the nation’s navy aviation historical past by changing into the primary father-daughter pair to fly in a formation of jets. The 2 officers flew in a formation of British-origin Hawk-132 superior jet trainers (AJTs) on the Bidar airbase in Karnataka.
Muskaan, who accomplished one 12 months of coaching on the Swiss-origin Pilatus PC-7 Mk II coach at AFA, will head to the Kalaikunda air drive station in West Bengal in early February to coach on the Hawk AJTs for a 12 months, earlier than she joins a fighter squadron, mentioned a second official. Air Commodore Singh commanded the Kalaikunda airbase throughout 2021-23. Muskaan attended Delhi’s Indraprastha Faculty for Girls earlier than becoming a member of AFA.
Round 30 ladies have been commissioned as fighter pilots within the IAF after the federal government cleared their induction into the fighter stream in 2016, a watershed in India’s navy historical past. That, nonetheless, was solely an experimental scheme that was transformed right into a everlasting one in February 2022.
The IAF has opened all frontiers for ladies and is giving them alternatives on a par with their male counterparts. In December 2023, the IAF inducted them in its non-officer cadre for the primary time as 153 Agniveervayu (ladies) handed out from the Airmen Coaching College Belagavi, Karnataka. They had been among the many 2,280 recruits inducted into the service.
The IAF has allowed additionally ladies officers to hitch the elite Garud commando drive, supplied they meet the standards for choice. Additionally in 2023, a lady officer, Group Captain Shaliza Dhami, took cost of a front-line IAF missile squadron close to the India-Pakistan border for the primary time.
Earlier this 12 months, Squadron Chief Mohana Singh grew to become India’s first lady Tejas fighter pilot, with the IAF assigning her to the No. 18 ‘Flying Bullets’ Squadron primarily based at Naliya in Gujarat. Mohana, one among India’s first ladies fighter pilots, was beforehand serving within the No. 3 ‘Cobras’ Squadron on the Nal fighter base close to Bikaner and flying the MiG-21 Bison plane.
Other than IAF’s newest Rafale jets, the IAF’s ladies pilots are additionally working the MiG-21s, Sukhoi-30s and MiG-29 fighters.
Girls in uniform are not on the fringes however are being assigned central roles on a par with their male counterparts. They’re flying fighter planes, serving on board warships, performing command roles, being inducted within the personnel under officer rank (PBOR) cadre, eligible for everlasting fee, and present process coaching on the premier Nationwide Defence Academy.
To make sure, tanks and fight positions within the infantry are nonetheless no-go zones for ladies. They had been permitted to hitch the armed forces outdoors the medical stream for the primary time in 1992, then to fill solely restricted roles in restricted streams for a restricted time as quick service commissioned officers.
Girls stole the limelight on the seventy fifth Republic Day parade on January 26, 2024, with ample illustration in each aspect of India’s greatest ceremonial occasion together with the flypast, mechanised columns, marching contingents, bands and the cultural extravaganza — the celebrations centred across the Nari Shakti theme.
Fifteen ladies pilots, together with six fighter pilots, took half within the flypast.
