Air wing for MHA on cards

[black eagle]

Air wing for MHA on cards

Finding itself wanting in times of exigencies, the Home Ministry will soon move a proposal in the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) to have its own dedicated full-fledged air wing by 2013.

The Centre aims to have 25 helicopters, maximum four medium range aircraft having the capacity of 125 seats and a number of smaller 20-30 seater aircraft in the Air Wing that will be manned by the BSF. Although the BSF currently has an Air Wing, it is poorly managed and has only four obsolete Avro aircraft of which only two are fit to fly.

The Ministry, sources said, was pushed to make the move after it found the response from the Indian Air Force (IAF) not quick enough in certain crunch situations caused by the Left-wing extremism, insurgency in the Northeast and the Kashmir separatism and in times of disasters. Paramilitary officers admit that during certain key operations against the Maoists in Chhattisgarh and Orissa they lost the advantage as the IAF could not send its choppers in time for deployment.

"The proposal, to be put before the CCS, will also include full-scale maintenance and repair centre and, hence totally self sufficient and independent of the IAF, including the pilots who will be picked up from the Paramilitary Forces and trained," sources added.

To check the misuse of the aircraft and the choppers by top officers of the Paramilitary Forces, the Home Ministry will also bring out extensive set of rules on the use of the Air Wing.

Meanwhile, the Centre has extended the air courier service for Paramilitary jawans to Jammu and Kashmir by positioning a dedicated Air India aircraft for Delhi-Jammu-Srinagar sector.

 

[Virendra]

Ok. I only want to know if these would be used by MHA babus or the security forces (Ops) under direct spectrum of the ministry.
For the former case - I wouldn't agree with even a new bicycle to be allotted .. and if its the latter they better do it quick as we don't want another 26/11 go sour; when they didn't even have a swift pre-planned deployment mechanism for NSG.

Regards,
Virendra

 

[black eagle]

Ok. I only want to know if these would be used by MHA babus or the security forces (Ops) under direct spectrum of the ministry.
For the former case - I wouldn't agree with even a new bicycle to be allotted .. and if its the latter they better do it quick as we don't want another 16/11 go sour; when they didn't even have a swift pre-planned deployment mechanism for NSG.

Regards,
Virendra

We all know how things work in this country. On paper they would probably be bought for reasons like fighting insurgency & naxalism but would instead end up being used by babus for their 'official' purpose.

 

[Tshering22]

I hope CCS cancels this MHA is not going to use this. NSG in specific has to use this if something goes wrong. Why the hell is it MHA's issue? NSG in 2008 itself had asked for special air wing of theirs to have transport planes and few helos but that was rejected. If Babus are going to use it, I hope it ends up like Reddy's case. Only I hope IAF pilots are not used to fly these. ACM Naik needs to put his foot down to have his pilots being used for transporting dirty REAL terrorists aka the babus of this country around.

 

[sandeepdg]

Yeah, absolutely. Under MHA's command, these air assets will surely be exploited by their babus. Rather, than putting them under MHA, they should be distributed to the CRPF, NSG, BSF. The helos should be distributed to these three forces individually, and the fixed wing aircraft should be kept under standby for emergency purposes under the BSF, which already has a air wing, for use by all the three forces as and when required. Already, there's an NSG base right next to the IGI airport, if they have complete authority to summon the fixed wing air assets, then they can reach any part of this country swiftly.

 

[Ray]

The poor babus and Chidambaram do not understand that airspace control is a tricky affair.

Even in the civilian airspace control there are continuous reports of near misses.

In a CI and combat environment, with helicopters, missiles, AD aircraft, Counter Air ops fighters, interdictors and then if everyone starts flying aircraft, then there will be one big Bugger's Muddle.