A flight of Eagles : The Westland Wapiti in Indian Air Force Service
"Military aviation came to India in Dec 1915, when a flight of Bristol BE2cs of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) arrived in Bombay and moved to Risalpur and Nowshera to support various Royal Army expeditions in the NWFP. Four Indians served in the RFC during the great war and one, Lt Indra Lal 'Laddie' Roy claimed 9 kills flying SE 5s with 40 Squadron winning the DFC posthumously (but this was not the end of the story, for, Indra Lal Roy's nephew later became one of the first six Indians trained at Cranwell, and later became the first Indian Squadron Commander, Station Commander and Chief of the Air Staff). Of the four only two were to return, Sardar Hardit Singh Malik, who began as an ambulance driver and finished with 28 Squadron RFC flying the Sopwith Camel (He later rose to Ambassador of India to France) and Lt Errol Sen who served with 70 sqn RAF and was shot down and taken PoW on 14 sep 1917 (later repatriated after the Armistice and leaving the service on 13 Dec 1918 and May 1919 respectively). This exposure to military aviation and the sacrifice of tens of thousands of Indians who died on foreign soil in the service of the crown during the war, gave rise to increasing demands for officer commissions in the armed forces and particularly for the formation of an independent Indian Air Arm.
The British finally agreed to consider the demand and set up a committee under Lt Gen Sir Andrew Skeene KCB, KCIE, CMG called the "Indian Sandhurst Committee" in 1925. This committee recommended that Indians be commissioned in the flying branch after training at RAF College Cranwell and that an air arm be formed under the Army in India. Fortunately and with great foresight, AVM John M Salmond, Air Officer Commanding in India (later Marshall of the RAF) prevailed upon the Govt to sanction an independent Air Arm. But it was only in 1930 that the formal decision was announced that six places would be reserved for Indians at Cranwell to train for what was finally to become the Indian Air Force.
The official act was passed on 08 Oct 32 (today celebrated as Air force day) vide Gazette of India No 41 (No 565) and the first six Indian pilot Officers were commissioned in 1933. These ‘Eagles' (the Himalayan Eagle was selected as a mascot) were to man the very first flight of four Wapiti IIA aircraft designated as ‘A' Flight of No 1 Squadron IAF at Drigh road (Karachi). These first aircraft were bought for a princely sum of £10.00 GBP each and were transferred from existing RAF squadrons in-country. The first commanding officer of the Squadron was Flt Lt Cecil Bouchier, DFC seconded from the RAF. The flight became operational on 1 Apr 1933, a date chosen by the British as it coincided with the birth of the RAF."
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