Dismissal of IAF Pilot Over Mi-17 Friendly-fire Incident?
According to officials familiar with the matter, a group captain is facing dismissal following a recommendation by a military court for lapses that resulted in a friendly-fire incident in which a Mi-17 V5 helicopter was shot down near Srinagar on 27 February 2019. The incident occurred on the day Pakistan air force targeted Indian installations in Jammu and Kashmir in response to an Indian airstrike on a terror camp in Pakistan’s Balakot. Group Captain Suman Roy Chowdhury was the chief operations officer of the Srinagar air base at the time. However, the verdict of the General Court Martial (GCM) is yet to be confirmed by Indian Air Force (IAF) chief Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari. The IAF chief is expected to decide on the sentence awarded by the GCM only after the Punjab and Haryana high court disposes of a matter related to the Mi-17 incident.
In March, the court ruled that the GCM could deliver its verdict with the rider that it would not be implemented till the disposal of the case. A Russian-origin utility helicopter was brought down by a surface-to-air missile, killing six IAF personnel and a civilian on the ground. This raised questions about whether ground crew, including air traffic controllers, had followed standard operating procedures. The IAF was on its highest alert on the day the helicopter was brought down in friendly fire. It expected Pakistan to respond to the unprecedented peacetime, cross-border airstrike on a Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terror camp in Balakot on 26 February 2019, which was in retaliation for the Pakistan-backed Pulwama suicide attack in which 40 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel were killed on 14 February 2019.
The GCM also awarded severe reprimand to Wing Commander Shyam Naithani, who oversaw the air traffic control at the base, in the Mi-17 friendly-fire incident. The military court found Chowdhury guilty of several charges, including violating a 2017 IAF directive that made it mandatory for all aircraft flying in a pre-designated airspace to operate with Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) devices to prevent friendly-fire incidents. Chowdhury was also charged with allowing the Mi-17 to take off without the IFF in operation and asking the missile unit to engage the aircraft.
According to Air Vice Marshal Anil Golani (Retd.), additional director general, Centre for Air Power Studies, there has been a definite shift in demanding accountability from officers involved in operations over the last two to three years. Punishment meted out for lapses has been swift and exemplary. The GCM's decision to order the group captain’s dismissal comes months after the government sacked three IAF officers in August 2022 for lapses that led to the accidental firing of a BrahMos missile into Pakistan on 9 March 2022. A court of inquiry held them responsible for deviating from standard operating procedures. One of the officers sacked was a group captain who oversaw the BrahMos missile battery when the weapon was launched from a base in the western sector during routine inspection and maintenance of the system.