The Corps of Army Air Defence

Kalaikunda, 7 September 1965

Lance Naik Madalai Muthu of 104 Air Defence Battery won the Vir Chakra at Kalaikunda on 7 September 1965, when Pakistani Sabres came over the airfield and his gun brought one down, according to the record of 28 Air Defence Regiment. The regiment had been raised as a light anti-aircraft unit at Hyderabad in 1956 and spent that war covering airfields.

Muthu's corps did not then exist. He belonged to the Regiment of Artillery, as did every air defence gunner until 1994.

A battery at Colaba

The first unit was 1 Indian Anti Aircraft Technical Training Battery, raised at Colaba in Bombay in September 1940. Official records cited by ThePrint give 15 September, while the Army's website has given the 14th. Indian troops trained first on 3-inch guns and then on the 40 mm Bofors, and served with Royal Artillery anti-aircraft batteries in Hong Kong and Singapore. In the Second World War the arm fought in the Burma campaign, at Imphal and Kohima, and in Arakan, Malaya, Bahrain, Iraq and Persia. Its wartime awards included four Military Crosses and seven Indian Distinguished Service Medals.

Soldiers of 45, 103 and 127 Regiments took part in the liberation of Goa in 1961, and air defence units covered the North East in 1962.

Sabres over Samba

One detailed record of these gunners in action concerns 29 Air Defence Regiment, raised at Secunderabad on 1 January 1957 with 40 mm L-60 guns. In 1965, serving under 1 Armoured Division in the Sialkot sector, it lost Gunner Prem Kumar, killed by enemy fire while downing a Sabre near Charma. Major Harnam Grover, commanding 107 Battery, shot down an aircraft and was seriously injured. His Mention in Despatches was the regiment's first gallantry award.

In 1971 the regiment protected 1 Corps in the Samba sector. Its own record says it repulsed repeated raids and shot down 11 aircraft over the war, five MiG-19s and six F-86 Sabres. It also records that the Pakistan Air Force changed tactics and began attacking the guns directly. Gunner Bhadreshwar Pathak won a posthumous Vir Chakra after hitting a MiG-19 and being fatally wounded the next day while resupplying his gun. Lance Havildar Bal Bahadur won the regiment's second, for two aircraft. These tallies are regimental claims and the dates of the heaviest raids vary within them.

Further south, 49 Air Defence Regiment recorded hits against Pakistani aircraft while supporting 11 Corps in Punjab and Rajasthan, including an F-86 hit on 14 December that crashed on the Pakistani side of the border. Four regiments, 27, 29, 45 and 151, received honour titles for the 1971 war.

Gopalpur, 28 September 2019

The Army Staff decided in October 1993 to take air defence out of the Regiment of Artillery, and the Corps of Air Defence Artillery came into being on 10 January 1994, with its directorate general opening the same day. It adopted its Sanskrit motto, आकाशे शत्रुन् जहि, in 1996, and a crest by Vijay Singh, commissioned through the National Institute of Design, showing a silver missile between gold radar antennae. In April 2005 it took its present name.

The question of which date to keep has not gone away. In August 2020 ThePrint reported that the raising day would move to 15 September, to recognise the Second World War origin; one retired general called the January date a truncation of the corps' history. The corps nonetheless marked its 32nd Corps Day on 10 January 2025.

President Ram Nath Kovind presented the President's Colours at Gopalpur on 28 September 2019. The Army Air Defence Centre, on 2,700 acres, received them for the corps. Reports of the ceremony gave the corps' tally as two Ashoka Chakras, two Kirti Chakras, 20 Vir Chakras, nine Shaurya Chakras, 113 Sena Medals and 55 Mentions in Despatches.

At a glance

• Raised: 10 January 1994 (as a separate corps); first anti-aircraft battery raised in September 1940
• Regimental centre: Army Air Defence Centre, Gopalpur, Odisha
• Motto: Akashe Shatrun Jahi (Kill the Enemy in the Sky)