Aviation Research Center Date Raised : 1963-09-07 Location : New Delhi The Aviation Research Centre (ARC) is India's imaging-intelligence organisation, a part of the Directorate General of Security, run by the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW). It started functioning in November 1962, in the wake of the Sino-Indian War, as an extension of the Intelligence Bureau, but placed under the Ministry of External Affairs. It was formally created on 7 September 1963, with Acting Group Captain Lal Singh Grewal as Operations Manager at Charbatia air base. It was later moved to the Prime Minister's Secretariat.
ARC was initially a temporary and ad hoc organisation, but was made permanent in 1971. Aerial surveillance, SIGINT operations, photo reconnaissance flights (PHOTINT), monitoring of borders, imagery intelligence (IMINT) were the main functions of the Aviation Research Centre (ARC). ARC operated bases at Charbatia Air Base in Choudwar; Sarsawa Air Base near Saharanpur & Dum Duma Air Base near Tinsukia in Assam. The ARC was headed by an Ops Manager and assisted by Assistant Ops Manager and Cdr, Air Wing. Crew were from three fleets - Canberra, Transport (An-12, C-46, C-90) & Helicopters (Mi-4, Mi-8 & Alloutte) |
Commanding Officers | |||||
01 Nov 62 - 31 Dec 67Group CaptainLal Singh Grewal2337 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | 01 Jan 68 - 31 Dec 68Air CommodoreLal Singh Grewal2337 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | 04 Feb 69 - Air CommodoreMurat Singh Aulakh1660 GD(O)Ops MgrDelhi | Unknown - 01 Dec 75Air Vice MarshalRandhir Singh2135 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | Unknown - Air Vice MarshalChandan Singh3460 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | |
01 Jan 81 - 22 Jan 84Air Vice MarshalChandra Kant Shantaram Raje4038 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | 01 Feb 97 - 31 Dec 99Air Vice MarshalAshok Kumar Goel8151 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi | 28 Feb 00 - Air Vice MarshalBijoy Krishna Pandey8990 F(P)Ops MgrDelhi |