AFOVA New Letter 2 of Year 2021

Section 7 – Panorama CV 2 No. 02 / 2021 Page 239 of 332 Words cannot express the pressure of these competitions and the pain involved in the preparations. It gets worse when Squadrons have reputations to protect. We at the ‘India’ Squadron had several such Terms, where we won the Banner staging epic struggles and then struggled even harder, to retain it the next term. One such term, the Squadron fell in at the NDA Parade Ground for the first of a potentially deadly series of practice sessions for the upcoming ‘Drill Competition’. We wore our lanyards on our left shoulders. There was much speculation as to which of the Squadron Officers would attend. Much depended on that. The sight of an unidentified Army Captain being escorted by the Drill Saab (a memberof an amazing section of Army soldiers, who specialize in drilling young Cadets on military movements) brought collective cheer. It was going to be ‘first day first show’ for a new Divisional Officer (DivO) the Squadron had only heard about. Surely this new guy couldn’t be ‘effective’ on day one. The newcomer came to a halt at an ‘Officer like distance’ from the Cadets and awkwardly squinted at them. He appeared to sway in the heat from the scorched parade ground. Then he spoke. When we heard his soft, thin voice, our hopes of an easy afternoon soared. What luck! “Good afternoon Gentlemen”, he started. Really a good afternoon, thought we. “Since I don’t know how good you guys are already, let me please watch you at drill first”. He had said ‘please’!!! Goodness!! What a softie!! This was easy. One had to simply perform at three levels below par and then climb one or two levels with a steady show of hard work and save the real stuff for the actual competition. The Squadron Cadet Captain (SCC) soon yelled out the necessary orders to turn the Squad to the right, and start marching. “Squadron Saav dhan (attention). Squadron theeno theen dahine chalega….”.