Wings of fire - Sir APJ ABDUL KALAM Wings of fire | Page 29

Bangalore as a city was in direct contrast to Kanpur. In
fact, I feel our country has an uncanny way of bringing out
extremes in her people. I suppose, it is because Indians
have been both afflicted and enriched by centuries of
migrations. Loyalty to different rulers has dulled our
capacity for a single allegiance. Instead, we have
developed an extraordinary ability to be compassionate
and cruel, sensitive and callous, deep and fickle, all at the
same time. To the untrained eye, we may appear colourful
and picturesque; to the critical eye, we are but shoddy
imitations of our various masters. In Kanpur, I saw paan-
chewing imitations of Wajid Ali Shah, and in Bangalore it
was replaced by dog-walking sahibs. Here too, I longed for
the depth and calmness of Rameswaram. The relationship
between the heart and the head of an earthy Indian has
been eroded by the divided sensibilities of our cities. I
spent my evenings exploring the gardens and shopping
plazas of Bangalore.
The workload at ADE during the first year of its
inception was quite light. In fact, I had to generate work for
myself at first, until the tempo gradually built up. Based on
my preliminary studies on ground-handling equipment, a
project team was formed to design and develop an
indigenous hovercraft prototype as a ground equipment
machine (GEM). The team was a small working group,
comprising four persons at the level of Scientific Assistant.
Dr OP Mediratta, Director of the ADE, asked me to lead
the team. We were given three years to launch the
engineering model.
The project was, by any standards, bigger than our
collective capabilities. None of us had any experience in
building a machine, let alone a flying machine. There were
no designs or standard components available to begin
with. All we knew was that we had to make a successful
heavier-than-air flying machine. We tried to read as much
literature as we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not
much available. We tried to consult people knowledgeable
in this area, but could find none. One day, I simply took the
decision to proceed with the limited information and
resources available.
This endeavour to produce a wingless, light, swift
machine opened the windows of my mind. I was quick to
see at least a metaphorical connection between a
hovercraft and an aircraft. After all, the Wright Brothers
made the first aeroplane after fixing bicycles for seven
years! I saw in the GEM project great opportunities for
ingenuity and growth. We went straight into hardware
development after spending a few months on the drawing
board.
There is always the danger that a person with my kind of
background— rural or small-town, middle-class, whose
parents had limited education— will retreat into a corner
and remain there struggling for bare existence, unless
some great turn of circumstance propels him into a more
favourable environment. I knew I had to create my own
opportunities.
Part by part, subsystem by subsystem, stage by stage,
things started moving. Working on this project, I learned
that once your mind stretches to a new level it never goes
back to its original dimension.
At that time VK Krishna Menon was the Defence
Minister. He was keenly interested in the progress of our
small project, which he envisioned as the beginning of the
indigenous development of India’s defence equipment.
Whenever he was in Bangalore, he always found some