When other kids of my age were busy spending time on PlayStations, I would dream of flying a plane. But this passion is not easy to develop as aircraft or flying is not accessible to everyone, especially at such a young age,” says Ishan Sahgal, 25, a licenced pilot and skydiver from Defence Colony.
Instead of letting his passion die, Sahgal scoured the Internet to watch every single video and documentary available on flying – you name it and he has seen it. Now, this Delhi lad is the Chief Operating Officer of Grob Aircraft, one of the world’s largest manufacturers of Composite Aircraft in Germany.
Under his leadership, the company has developed a Pilot Selection and Evaluation System (PSES).
This tool has dramatically reduced the time consumed and costs incurred in training the military pilots. “This computerised tool utilises a combination of methods to test candidates on basic pilot skills, operational competencies and psychological factors,” says Sahgal.
The selection process used to take a year with the old system because there was minimal computer-aided testing, and a lot of it was pen-paper based. Now, all of this can be completed in 2.5 days. “In the old system, the flying test was done by actually flying in an aircraft, which involved usage of expensive simulators.
But our system is an all-in-one unit in which, apart from incorporating pen and paper tests, we test for a multitude of factors. For example, students were made to learn a list of abbreviations and then reproduce them.
Apart from checking the final answers, we also consider variables such as how much time they took to learn, how well they followed the instructions, how confidently they answered and how many times they changed their answers. The system incorporates a simulator which uses Artificial Intelligence to guide the student through flying and then grades the performance, leaving no room for bias,” informs the high school graduate from GD Goenka School, who secured a BSc (Hons) in International Business from the University of Bradford through IILM in 2015.
The G 120TP training system, Sahgal notes, is being used by the US Army, Royal Air Force UK, Argentine Air Force, Mexican Airforce, Indonesian Air Force, Myanmar Air Force, Royal Jordanian Air Force. “Even the Ecuadorean and Ethiopian Air Forces recently signed up with us.” But India is not among the users. Why? “Unfortunately, when India selected its training system in 2009, we were not ready with ours. However, I am confidently pursuing our Make in India objectives with the hope that we will eventually be able to support our forces in India. To rely on first closing a procurement programme in India would mean years of waiting, given how slowly things move here.”
It was while playing polo, another of Sahgal’s interests, he met Grob Aircraft CEO André Hiebeler on the European Circuit at age 19.
Hiebeler became his mentor, and later offered him a position as an intern at Grob Aircraft. Grob now has an in-house team with Indians, whose focus is to further these initiatives in India. “The aim is to design and develop products that suit India’s needs. We also want to set up a production line in India. Talks are on with potential industrial partners. I am looking at 2020 being the year when we can make big strides to realise this dream.”