The last time I was at Lohegaon – the IAF base – a few of years ago,it was for a project (a show). At that time i interacted with a lot of pilots from the IAF. They seemed to be some of the least sexist people that i have ever met in my professional life. They didn’t seem to make any assumptions of ability based on gender – either that, or they were very good at hiding it. I honestly think that it was the former. One of the people that i met there was a lady who flew transporters. We generally got chatting and i asked her if she could fly fighters. She said that women weren’t allowed to fly fighters. And somehow that statement contradicted all that i had imbibed at the base. I really didn’t see the men there having an issue with women flying fighters. And today that impression is vindicated. Senior members of the [tag] Indian Air Force[/tag] backed the idea? have of women flying fighter planes.

Having imparted training to female pilots for transport aircraft and choppers for 15 years, senior IAF officials and researchers now strongly believe the time has come to open the doors of fighter cockpits to women cadets as they have been consistently performing at par with their male counterparts.

Stories like this give one hope! Well, hats off to the men in the IAF for being gender blind, and may their tribe increase.