IAF flies 930 sorties on election duty

14 May 2009

By the end of the last phase of elections on 13 May the IAF undertook a total of 930 sorties and flew 780 hours for election tasks that included airlifting 6792 passengers, 137 tons of election material and 436 electronic voting machines.

In an unprecedented airlift undertaken by the IAF's transport fleet, two IL-76 and four AN-32 airlifted 3234 central para military forces alone from Imphal to Kalaikunda in three days, from 26 to 28 April.

A major role of the Indian Air Force (IAF) mandate during peace time is aid to civil power. The IAF's transport and helicopter fleet invariably remain at the forefront of such assigned tasks. Facilitating the unenviable task of conducting the electoral process spearheaded by the Election Commission, two IL-76, four AN-32 transport aircraft, 25 medium-lift helicopters and four Chetak helicopters of IAF were pressed into service during the just concluded elections.

The helicopters drawn from 13 different IAF airbases across the country were provided to 14 states - Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, Tripura, Orissa, West Bengal, Jammu & Kashmir and the Union Territory of Andaman & Nicobar Islands.

While flying over most areas for poll-related duties may seem routine, sorties over the naxal affected regions for some pilots proved anything else but routine. For the Mi-17 crew of Squadron Leader R Dhobhal and Flying Officer K Prakash, facilitating the battle of ballot in their call of duty also turned out to be an experience of facing bullets fired by naxals.

The incident occurred on April 16, at Binagonda in Gadchiroli District, bordering Chhattisgarh in Maharashtra. Tasked with airlifting a polling party of five members and EVMs, the Mi-17 crew was airborne from nearby Aheri to pick up the election officials from Binagonda and drop them at Laheri, a mere five-minutes flying-time away.