NEW DELHI: Scripting history, flying officer Avani Chaturvedi has become the first Indian woman to fly a fighter aircraft, an IAF official said.
” Avani Chaturvedi became the first Indian woman to fly a fighter aircraft solo when she flew a MiG-21 bison in her first solo flight,” the official.
She undertook the sortie from IAF’s Jamnagar base on Monday, he said.
Three women pilots, Chaturvedi, Bhawana Kanth and Mohana Singh, had undergone strenuous training programme to fly fighter jets.
They were commissioned as flying officers in July 2016, less than a year after the government decided to open the fighter stream for women on an experimental basis.
The IAF has already selected the next batch of three women trainee pilots for the fighter stream.
On 16 December 2017 two women from the second batch to enter the fighter stream of the Indian Air Force were commissioned after graduating from the Air Force Academy, Dindigul.
In Navy, women officers are inducted through short service commission, in Logistics, Law, Observers, Air Traffic Control (ATC), Pilots (Maritime Reconnaissance Stream), Naval Armament Inspectorate cadre (NAIC), Naval Architecture and Education Branch.
It was only in 1992 that the armed forces began recruiting women to streams, other than the Medical stream.
The Indian Air Force (IAF) has pioneered the entry of women as officers in flying and ground duty.
In the IAF since 1993, women officers have been inducted in all branches and stream as Short Service Commissioned Officers except in the fighter stream. However, IAF has revised Short Service Commission scheme to induct women into the fighter stream on experimental basis for five years.
The IAF has already selected the next batch of three women trainee pilots for the fighter stream.
Avani Chaturvedi’s achievement has put India on the list of the countries such as Britain, the United States, Israel, and Pakistan, where women are allowed to fly fighter jets.
