Group Captain Sajjad Rahim (13031) AE (M) was commissioned as an Engineer in the Aeronautical Engineering (Mechanical) Branch on 17 Jan 72. He has held the appointments of Flight Engineer Leader, Officer Commanding, Director at Air HQ and Chief Engineering Officer, Air Force Academy. He is a graduate from Defence Services Staff College, a postgraduate in Aerospace Engineering from IIT, and holds Master Degree in Business Administration. During his tenure as JD/Director, Armament & Safety Equipment, he evolved a concept and methodology to rejuvenate life expired bombs by opening up the bomb body, removing the life expired charge and replacing it with advanced High Explosive charge. The recycling of the 3200 old bombs held the potential of saving of Rs 30 crore initially at the rate of Rs 95,000 per bomb. This has now become a regular practice. As Chief Engineering Officer at Air Force Academy, since 09 Nov 98, by dedication, hard work and professionalism he changed the work culture and made the organisation more focussed. His skillful management resulted in improvement of Kiran fleet average serviceability from 59% in 1998 to 83% in 2000. The corresponding figures for HPT-32 aircraft were 69% and 85%. 100% serviceability was achieved on Kiran and HPT-32 fleets on 39 and 59 occasions respectively. The sustenance of high serviceability resulted in smooth conduct of annual flying training task of 5,500 hours for Kiran and 11,500 hours for HPT-32. During his stewardship 48 Kiran and 56 HPT-32 aircraft were recovered from prolonged non-availability. The non- availability of critical components like cooling Air pack and Artificial Horizon for Kiran was overcome by putting in place a system for transferring the components between flying aircraft, thus improving aircraft availability. In addition, the serviceability of systems such as Radiotelephony, Arrester barrier, Telephone exchange, etc was maintained over 99%. By tactful liaison with DoT, the Ultra High Frequency linked telephone circuit was changed over to optical fibre cable, without any breakdown of communication links, leading to a saving of Rs Two lakhs annually.

For his dynamic leadership, professional dedication and distinguished services of a high order, the Hon'ble President is pleased to award 'Vishisht Seva Medal' to Group Captain Sajjad Rahim.