Kunal Barpatte

Biography

Flight Lieutenant Kunal Barpatte hailed from Nigadi village in the Pimpri-Chinchwad tehsil of Pune district in Maharashtra, and was the son of Shri Rajendra Barpatte and Smt Vidya Barpatte. He completed his B.Sc in Electronics from Fergusson College, Pune. Fascinated by the Air Force since childhood, he always aspired to be an air warrior. Pursuing this dream, he cleared the Combined Defence Services Examination and joined the Air Force Academy at Dundigal, Hyderabad, where he was selected for the flying branch and trained as a Navigator with the 111th NAV Course. He was commissioned as a Flying Officer on 18 December 2010. He was subsequently posted to an operational squadron at Air Force Base Jorhat in Assam, and later to an AN-32 squadron based at Sulur in Tamil Nadu. By July 2016, Flt Lt Barpatte was serving with No. 33 Squadron at Sulur near Coimbatore, a transport unit long associated with AN-32 operations. On 22 July 2016, he was detailed as Navigator of an AN-32 (K-2743) tasked to carry men and material from Chennai to the Air Force station at Port Blair in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, flying alongside captain Flt Lt Pushpender Badsara and co-pilot Fg Offr Pankaj Kumar Nandal. The aircraft took off from Tambaram Air Force Station at 8.30 am with 29 people aboard. At 9.12 am, about 42 minutes after takeoff and roughly 151 nautical miles east of Chennai, the aircraft lost contact with ground radar and disappeared over the sea. A massive search operation involving the Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard failed to locate it, and on 15 September 2016 all 29 aboard were declared presumed dead. The wreckage was finally located in January 2024 at a depth of 3,400 metres. A dedicated and competent air warrior, Flt Lt Kunal Barpatte laid down his life in the line of duty.