Ranjan Dutt

Air Vice Marshal Ranjan Dutt, VrC (30 September 1921 or 1922 – 13 August 2009) was a former air officer of the Indian Air Force. He last served as the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief Eastern Air Command. Prior to that, he was the managing director of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited.

In 1940 Dutt was one of the 24 Indian pilots seconded to the UK for operational training and squadron service. There, he was selected for fighter training and subsequently spent the summer of 1941 protecting convoys through the English Channel and flying Hurricanes with No. 32 Squadron RAF after the Battle of Britain. He served in North Africa and the Middle-East in the latter part of that year before returning to India to join No. 4 Squadron IAF at Peshawar, North-West Frontier. There, he flew sorties from Miranshah in the Datakhel operations. In June 1944 he became one of the first Indian flight instructors at a training unit in Risalpur. The following year he completed a flight leader course at RAF Tangmere in the UK, and then joined No. 8 Squadron IAF in Mingaladon as a flight commander.

Later, in a senior post at the Operational group, Dutt led several air missions in the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947–1948. On 26 January 1950 he was awarded the second Vir Chakra.