Range Firing

Like all other days when we have to report to the unit, this time also we cadets get up before the first ray of light is visible in the horizon. Somehow managing to take bath and wear our uniforms, we give final touches to it. All ready, we board the bus, just thinking about what lays ahead of us. Happy for the fact that a bus has been arranged for us from the college side, thanks to the efforts of the seniors, we settle down. Not the most charged up, trying to get those forty winks, we complete our bus journey to the unit.

A bit of confusion regarding which unit we are supposed to report, we finally figure it out and bid goodbye to our college bus. Met by similar faces from the unit, we report to them, form the flight according to the instructions from the senior (saavdhan vishram isn't that easy with bag packs). The range has already been set up for us and being in the 'A flight', we will be the first to fire, once junior division and junior wing are done. On the command of the PI staff we all sit down and watch as Rana sir gives us instructions prior to firing. The first set of junior division is all set when we hear the shrill voice of Rana sir “cadets on your own time, on your aim, fire”. Then all we can hear is thar thar thar. We try to see the targets to find out how many got their aim right on the 1ft by 1ft cardboard. Then something happens, there is news of someone getting killed in the nearby village, though it seems impossible as the bullets we use are not the ones used in field but as per the orders we need to relocate ourselves to a new range.

In the 3-ton, we cadets fit ourselves and the rifles, the vehicle moves out of the unit and after traversing for 5 minutes the vehicle comes to a halt, we cadets get down to find a restaurant . Once we locate it and find ourselves seats we are served rice dumplings with piping hot sambhar and coconut paste.

Then back on the vehicle we move towards our final destination. After traveling for some time, around 1km short of range we stop at a school, so we can refill our water bottles and recharge ourselves as the place we are heading is nothing but barren land.

After this stop some cadets choose to walk and rest come in the same vehicle. As soon as we reach, we start clearing the grass around the area and dig the metal frames on which the targets are to be placed.

All of us are given ten rounds to fire. If you ask me how was your firing, then i say its something so breathtaking that one has to experience it to feel it. After we all finish we collect the metal frames and load it back on the 3-ton. Then we clean the rifles, arrange them back on the in the vehicle, get ourselves into the same. We reach the same spot where we initially halted, the school is now over and the kids are rushing out. We help ourselves with fresh tamarinds plucked from the trees. There is a small school canteen where we find biscuits to kill our hunger. After some time the three ton arrives, we get ourselves into it, carrying the unforgivable memories of the day. A memorabilia seriously!

T-shirts: from idea to cloth

I take the honors of contributing the first post to this blog!

Every year NCC cadets have to attend a training camp. These camps are filled with fun and tiring activities such as drill, culturals, sports, etc.

In the camps of 3TN Air Sqn, cadets from other colleges wore NCC t-shirts they designed. This inspired us to design our own NCC T-shirts.

Two cadets from my batch (Leading Flight Cadet Palleti Yugendar and Cadet Warrant Officer Aasim Hussain) designed the T-shirt (shown below)
The colour in the middle was changed to the colour on the periphery (the navy blue). A brief explanation of the design:

On the front: the IAF logo is on the chest with the name of the cadet. The left sleeve has the NITT logo and the right sleeve has the NCC logo.

On the back: The labels are as follows.
3(TN) Air Sqn (Tech) NCC - our NCC unit at Trichy - it is a techical squadron under the air wing of NCC.
22 - This number was replaced by every cadet's regimental number
'A' Flight - Under each unit each

college's flight is given a letter - NITT's is A.

We showed the design to our juniors and they liked it too. Got in touch with a supplier called Leela (based in tirupur, Tamil Nadu) and he priced the T-shirt around 250 rupees. Since this was a bit pricey, our cadets wanted to use their mess credit (known as messbill at NITT) and we had undergone a VERY LONG process to get this done. Here goes:

1. Two junior cadets go see the Deputy Registrar to find out the procedure to debit amount from mess bill. - Mar 18
   
2. Orders were taken from present and past (people that discontinued NCC without finishing the full program).
3. I went and talked to the dean students with a tentative letter and he explained the procedure. Get a letter signed by our staff advisor (Associate NCC Officer - ANO), get it signed by him, get a verification from the hostel office that all the students are on the mess bill and that they have the amounts, and then a sign from the director. We (me in combination with a few others) went to all these people below to get this done. - Mar 20
   
4. I wrote a letter and went to see Aasim at the mechanical dept (he was there when i needed his signature) - Mar 31
5. got a forwarded sign from our ANO - mar 31
   
6. Went to see the deputy registrar to see if the letter was written in proper format - mar 3
7. Went to see the dean students three times - once each on Apr 1,2,3 - finally saw him on April 3 and got his signature to move to the hostel office for verification
8. went to the hostel office to get the verification signature (to verify that all the cadets were on the mess bill). they found something wrong with the MIS and told me to wait - Apr 6
9. Went to a Computer support group staff to get our excel spreadsheet modified so that the MIS would read it - Apr 8
10. Went to the hostel office on Apr 9 and they lady I needed to see wasn't there.
11. Hostel office had misplaced the letter so I had to get the xerox copy of the letter I took (thank god I took it, otherwise I would have had to do steps 4-10 AGAIN!!). They wanted the dean's written instruction to verify students on the mess bill. - apr 13
    
12. Got the written instruction from the dean - apr 13
    
13. Got verification from the hostel office - apr 13
14. Went to the dean to get another sign to go see the director - apr 13
15. Went to the director - he asked for the registrar to sign it then only he will sign it- apr 14
16. Went to the registrar to get approval - apr 15
17. Went to the director to get his signature - apr 15
18. Hostel office debited amounts from mess bill and wanted signatures of Deputy Registrar, Registrar and Director to approve this - apr 16
19. Went to Deputy registrar to get his sign to debit amount - apr 16
20. went to registrar to get his sign to debit amount - apr 16
21. went to director to get his sign to debit amount - apr 16
22. Hostel office issued a cheque for the amount debited from everyone's mess bill. The signs needed in step 18 were needed again on the cheque. - apr 16
23. Went to deputy registrar - apr 16
24. went to registrar - apr 16
25. went to director. For this sign we had to wait for about an hour and a half - apr 16
26. CWO Aasim went to the bank to get the DD. They wanted a written notice from the deputy registrar to get the DD - apr 17
27. Went to the deputy registrar to get the sign - apr 17
28. Got the DD for the amount - apr 17

Expected the number of trips to hit 30 - sad that it didn't :(. Might have missed out on some trips somewhere in the middle. Hopefully some of my NCC readers catch them so that the number of trips can hit 30!

Things that weren't mentioned above were running around getting orders from students over a week (mar 25-mar 30). For that many people had put in effort from different years. Hats off to those people also!

The T-shirts finally came on May 9. The delivery was originally scheduled on May 2. The T-shirts have come out as designed but the material was a bit too thick.

I will put up a scanned copy of the letter to show how many signatures were on it when i get a hold of it.

On a more general note, this is a micro model of how things work in India. To get something done people have to be really determined and on their feet due to regulations that tire people out before they get something small done.

Personally, for me this was a good experience. When I got my T-shirt, I felt that I truly deserved it.