Great Expectations No.8 For Squadron Leader Mahinder Singh Pujji (Gravesend) 

Oil on Canvas 

24cm x 18cm

2024 

Squadron Leader Mahinder Singh Pujji DFC (14 August 1918 – 18 September 2010), was a distinguished Royal Air Force fighter pilot and one of the first Indian Sikh pilots to volunteer with the Royal Air Force during the Second World War. He is one of the few Indian pilots to have also served in all three major theatres of the Second World War.

Mahinder was born in Simla, India, on 14 August 1918. He learned to fly in 1936 as a hobby pilot at the Delhi Flying Club. His first job was with Himalayan Airways as a line pilot, flying passengers between Haridwar and Badrinath.

In 1940, Pujji's sense of duty and daring adventurism instinctively caused him to attend the advertised appeal for "A" licensed pilots and despite his parents' fears; he became one of the first batch of 24 Indian pilots accepted into Royal Air Force during the early part of the Second World War.

He flew mainly Hurricanes, which he preferred to Spitfires, for their relative ease of flying. He was forced down on several occasions; in one instance, his aircraft was disabled over the English Channel by a Messerschmitt Bf 109, but he managed to coax his aircraft to dry land, crashing near the White Cliffs of Dover. He was rescued from the burning wreckage and after a week in hospital returned to duty.

By September 1945 Pujji had spent almost four years on continuous operational flying duty, considered unusual even by standards of the Second World War.

For his service bravery over Japanese occupied territory, Pujji was awarded the DFC in 1945, in recognition of gallantry and devotion to duty in the execution of air operations.

In 2005, Pujji protested the British National Party's symbolic usage of a Spitfire aircraft image in their political campaign literature. He was reported as saying,

"The BNP are wrong to use the Spitfire as representative of their party. They forget people from different backgrounds helped in the Second World War. I am proof of this - I was flying a Spitfire. I also met Winston Churchill. Even in those days, there were ethnic minorities fighting for the British."

In August 2010, Pujji's autobiography For King And Another Country was released.

A statue of Squadron Leader Pujji, by sculptor Douglas Jennings, was unveiled in Gravesend, on 28 November 2014. It bears the inscription: "To commemorate those from around the world who served alongside Britain in all conflicts 1914-2014". The Gravesend community, which has one of the largest Gurdwaras in the UK, raised £70,000 for the statue in a month.