He said that Indian Air Force “continued to maintain a high combat potential,” despite facing various operational and maintenance challenges associated with the transformation phase.

In a message of support and best wishes to all the Air Warriors, Non-Combatant (Enrolled) personnel, Defence Security Corps personnel, Civilians and Air Force Veterans of the Indian Air Force and their families for the New Year – 2013, the Air Chief Marshal also said that in the year gone by “we faced many new challenges and we also achieved significant milestones.”

Warming up his team to face new challenges ahead, he said : “Bigger challenges await us as we step into the New Year; challenges that will stretch our physical and mental capabilities. The timely integration of the new inductions with the existing legacy systems, while ensuring a high combat potential and addressing all aerospace safety concerns will be our key operational challenges. Towards this, Exercises-‘Iron Fist’ and ‘Live Wire’ are planned early this year. We must capitalise on this opportunity for revalidating and fine-tuning our operational employment philosophies in a near real-time op scenario.”

“As long as we can anchor all our actions to our core values of Mission-Integrity-Excellence and work with pride, we will always achieve our mission,” he said.

The Air Chief Marshal is of the view that with “more than any of the high technology acquisitions in the future”, Indian Air Force would be “the real enablers of our growth story.”

“Irrespective of the position in which you may be presently serving in, I expect you to provide quality leadership to your subordinates. Invest your time in mentoring, guiding and training, and work towards creating an environment where each and every air warrior feels as a valuable member of the Indian Air Force family,” he appealed.

Reminding his team about facing the challenges of the previous year through “collective competence and resolve” and with a “sense of pride in the values which the IAF represents”, the Air Chief Marshal said that new initiatives have been undertaken for infrastructure upgradation.

“We have also put into place many new initiatives in the areas of infrastructure upgradation, training, empowerment of our air warriors and institution of a Directorate of Air Veterans, which will have long term implications for the IAF. Looking back today, we can justifiably take pride in our collective achievements and contribution towards the growth of IAF,” he said.

He also complimented his team for the work they had done by saying ““Our air warriors always remained at the forefront of all important nation building tasks be it executing humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations, supporting anti-naxal operations or while providing aid to civil authorities by undertaking support missions in the remote and inaccessible regions of our country.”