This is what Abhishek Bachchan was singing in one of his recent film and while listening to this song a few days; I was reminded about how true this is. I went to pick the paper and that showed the picture of grieving parents of a pilot who was killed in an air crash. No points for guessing, it was a MIG 21, the flying coffin of Indian Air Force.

All this time the IAF had made us believe that a pilot is infinitely more precious than an airplane and losing an airplane is unfortunate but losing a pilot is a lot more tragic.

Indian Air Force has been operating a fleet of 175 MIG 21s. Well that is the number but I am not sure how many of them are still left and how many have crashed killing the pilots as well. The Russians first manufactured the plane in the year 1959. Currently 55% of the fleet of IAF consists of MIG 21s and thus it must be very expensive to replace them with better planes. The Russians have stopped production of the plane in 1975 but the IAF still flies them. I guess a big part of the pilots flying the MIGs must have been born after they stopped making the planes.

I don't know who is actually responsible for it. It may be the seniors in the Indian Air Force who don't want to make the unpopular suggestion, it may be the defense ministry who doesn't want to spend the money but who ever it is, is seriously jeopardizing the lives of pilots. I guess the pilot to them in not important as a human life but as a human resource on which they have made significant investment on teaching how to fly a plane.

The Air Force has claimed that most of the crashes are due to pilot error. I find it a little difficult to believe that all the bad pilots are flying the MIG21s otherwise how would you explain only MIG 21s crashing and not the other planes. While in school, I also appeared in the exam for NDA and found out how difficult it is to become a fighter pilot in the IAF. I have also heard about the best training being provided in the IAF to it's pilot. Now what is true here and what am I supposed to believe. Should I believe that whatever we heard about the pilots of IAF being the best in the world in false or should I believe that the crashes are indeed the fault of negligent pilots?

Lack of resources is something that all of us have experienced, at work, at home, practically everywhere. A situation where everything that you need is available is a utopian but a situation where you are missing the basic things is frustrating. Think about it, if you are working in a place where you are not provided the basic tools you need to work, how long will you stay there. Not to long is my guess. Think about the Air Force pilots. If they also start feeling disappointed by the behaviors of our government what will they do? I guess for them it is not so easy to just quit as they are required to serve for a minimum number of years, they will eventually start quitting after they have served the that period. The civil aviation industry in India is doing very well and needs a lot of pilots. Worse still, what if someone like Gen. Parvez Musharraf feels like it is about time the Indian government needs a boot and get into power. I guess then the president of US will be saying the Indian head "Restore the democracy in the next two years" just like he told Musharaf during his last visit to Pakistan.

I am really frustrated with how we are sacrificing so many people to save money. In doing that we are also compromising the security of our country by have inadequate planes to protect us.

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.