AFOVA New Letter 2 of Year 2021

Section 5 – War Diary CV 2 No. 02 / 2021 Page 108 of 332 9 Salute This Hero of the 1971 War! Air Cmde Nitin Sathe Genre: War Diary he helicopters joined in around the evening of December 5, 1971. General Sagat Singh and then Group Captain Chandan Singh planned to use helicopters for the insertion of troops into East Pakistan. Airlifting troops from the 4/5 Gurkha Rifles across the Meghna river started the race between Indian commanders towards Dacca." "It was fun to interact with the chopper boys, but finding a place to sleep became a problem! "We were packed like sardines in the passenger hall of the airfield now. "There were some immediate seniors and juniors in the crowd. It was good to meet some of them after our association at the academy. "We shared news of what we learnt on missions and on the radio. "We came to know that a few of our friends had lost their lives in the operations but there was no time to grieve. We chatted through the night till sleep overtook us.’ "The chopper boys did an excellent job without a single casualty, although they got a few bullets into their machines. Their josh and morale was sky high; it was evident when every single and some double hands were raised when the flight commander asked for volunteers!" says Air Commodore Arun Dattraya Karandikar (retd), who sadly passed into the ages on Sunday, June 13, 2021. T