NEW DELHI: “Flying might not be all smooth sailing, but the fun of it is worth the price.” Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly solo, said once. Same was Ram Nath Chawla's passion for flying, when he became the first Indian to fly from Karachi to England in 17 days in 1930.
This Monday, March 20, is the 87th anniversary of their landing in London.
When 25-year-old Chawla took the first flight with Aspy Engineer, 17, as passenger, from Karachi, all was not a smooth sailing.
Chawla had lost his bearing in a dense fog in the Channel and was circling round a ship at a height of 50 feet until someone on board signalled the direction of the coast. They then landed and tried to find the Thames but again lost their way. And this time, the engine stopped and they slowly started going down. “My father was never afraid of dying. He knew it was the best way to go. But fortunately, when they had imagined a watery grave, the engine started and they zipped up in the air,” says Avtar, Chawla’s youngest son, who was closest to him.
All this started when Chawla was an 18-year-old engineering student at England’s Nottingham University in 1920s. One day his landlord took him to the British Parliament to show him around. There he heard a Londoner say that never in lifetime will a “bloody Indian” be able to fly a plane from India to England. Seemingly hurt, he decided to prove him wrong and left aeronautical engineering, and started pursuing flying at Nottingham Aero Club.
He came back to India with ‘A’ flying licence. Once in India, he wanted to buy a plane but didn’t have the capital. He got together with his dad’s Parsi friend’s son, Engineer, and decided to try for the Aga Khan prize of £500—proposed for the Indian who will fly from India to England.
On March 3, 1930, in suit, boot, tie and air goggles, and without any luggage, they embarked on the journey on their D H Moth Aircraft fitted with Gipsy engine. “He would never travel with clothes or food. He preferred buying them during halts. He even avoided repeating clothes,” says Chawla’s daughter-in-law Sushmita.
The flight was nearly spoilt at Malta, a southern country island in Europe, due to a gale. A dozen people were needed to prevent the plane from being carried away by the wind. And once again bad weather forced them to land in Africa, but they resumed flight. After many such halts and at a speed of 80 miles per hour, they reached Marignane in France on March 18.
“He was very passionate about flying. He once landed his plane on a tree, and another time a vulture had hit his aircraft but he still flew the tilted plane,” Avtar says.
They received a grand welcome in Croydon, England, but couldn’t win the Aga Khan prize. They had missed out on one important detail that it had to be a solo flight. However, a government prize of `7,500 greeted them after their return home.