The world's highest point-Mount Everest - was visited by the Indian Air Force, eight days after its first conquest by Tensing and Hillary.

Though arrangements were in hand to fly out an IAF aircraft over the summit on the day the first news of its conquest was splashed across the world, the flight was deliberately deferred for a few days. This postponement was a necessary precaution against even a remote possibility of setting in train loose masses of snow into avalanches by the sound of aircraft engine over the area while the climbers might still have been on the range.

Operating from an airfield in Bihar, Flight Lieut A.E. Paul with his crew took off in an IAF aircraft just after 8 am on June 6, 1953. Setting its course northwards and continuously ascending, the aircraft, an hour later, came close to the silver crested massive wall of the Himalayas. The sun baked plains gave way to subdued rocky woods, peeping through an extensive but scattered flock of low lying clouds. In another 20 minutes, the aircraft was amidst the eternally white wilderness, looking for the summit.

Flying well over 32,000 feet above sea level, at a temperature many degrees below freezing point, the aircraft flew astride Mount Everest over the Nepalese territory. At that height the whole assembly of high peaks was clear of clouds, the sun flooding the entire realm of snow gods for many miles under the canopy of a speckless sky. Jutting out of a sea of undulating, snowcapped towering peaks. Everest stood out unmistakeably. Apart from its awe-inspiring stature and mass, the gigantic. Mount seemed to have a distinctive personality of its own. Flying three thousand feet above the summit, Everest appeared like an unconventional pyramid of platinum in the midst of many other oddly shaped silver heaps, all set in a massive copper bowl of barren rocks with a faint blue veil of the sky over it.

A complete photographic record of this historic flying visit to Mount Everest on "D-day plus 8" of its first conquest, and again on a second flight on June 7, was made by IAF personnel using their still and cine cameras loaded with colour and black-and-white films.

The Passing out Parade at the National Defence Academy this year is significant for the fact that the Academy now has completed 20 years of its existence, during which it has served as the main nursery for officers, firstly, of the Army alone and later of the three Services.

Inaugurated in 1932 as the Indian Military Academy, it was intended to lay the foundation for the Army's self-sufficiency in officer personnel. In 1941 the Academy was converted into an Officers' training school with the task of producing a large number of Officers - both British and Indian - in the shortest possible time. Its capacity was greatly increased and for the next five years the Academy played an important part in solving the problem of meeting the greatly increased demand for officers under the stress of war.

In 1946 the Academy underwent a complete re-organisation both in its establishment and in its courses. The first batch of new cadets passed out in February 1946 after ten-month course. The second course, duration of which was increased to 18 months, passed out in December, 1947. The third course of two years’ duration was commissioned in September 1948 after 21 months' training. The duration of all subsequent courses has been fixed at two years with a bi-annual intake.

After the attainment of independence, the Academy was once again re-organised and some major changes were introduced in it, the greatest of these was the establishment of a Joint Services Wing for combined preliminary training to officers of all the three Services.

At this stage the Indian Military Academy was renamed Armed Forces Academy and this name was further changed to National Defence Academy. In addition to the Joint Services Wing the Academy continued to have a Wing called the Military Wing for the training of officers of the Army exclusively. One of the main objects of the Joint Services Wing is that future Officers of the Services should grow up in an atmosphere which helps them to understand each other better.

The cadets receive two years training at the Joint Services Wing at the end of which Naval and Air Force cadets go to their respective Service training establishment while cadets for the Army join the Military Wing for a further course of two years training.