Group Captain Manovinder Shamsher Bahadur Singh Jauhar (12201) F (P) was commissioned in the Flying Branch of the IAF on 20 Dec 69. He was inducted in the fighter stream and has over 3600 hrs of flying to his credit. He is a qualified flying instructor (QFI), has done the Staff Course and is a post graduate in the Defence Studies. He has also served as a QFI in Iraq. In 1979 he converted to Canberra and took active part in Operation Meghdoot and Operation Pawan. He commanded the Canberra Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron between 1990-92.

Between 1993-95 he served as Chief Operations Officer at AF Station Leh. Despite the constraints of manpower and resources, he supervised and controlled the safe conduct of all air operations for Op Meghdoot in the high altitude and hostile environment. He also set up and activated the BADC for Leh sector.

In Dec 1995 Gp Capt Jauhar was posted as Joint Director Weapons at Air Headquarters with the additional responsibility of coordination all tech and logistics function of weapons planning for the IAF. The revision of IAF's operational philosophy and induction of advanced weapon systems required a reworking of War Waging Reserves for weapons for the IAF. Gp. Capt Jauhar quickly gained in-depth knowledge of the weapon systems, involved himself with various trials and evaluations and completed the above task. He liaised with various defence development and production agencies to initiate indegenisation and achieve prioritised production for IAF requirements. Along with his dedicated team of officers he also identified various shortcomings in our weapon holdings and the storage facilities and initiated remedial actions. Stores like LGBs and R-73E missiles were made operational at the earliest.

With the commencement of Op Safed Sagar the awareness of above weapon limitation helped in ensuring that only the correct and complete weapons reached the field formations. Along with his team of officers and airmen, Gp Capt Jauhar ensured that weapon requirements, weapon logistics and weapon data was processed round the clock at Air Headquarters and weapon stocking as per field requirements completed in the shortest time.

For his distinguished service of a very high order, the Hon'ble President is pleased to award 'Vishisht Seva Medal' to Group Captain Manovinder Shamsher Bahadur Singh Jauhar.