{"id":22513212,"date":"2026-09-15T13:25:36","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T11:25:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/?p=22513212"},"modified":"2026-09-15T14:15:44","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T12:15:44","slug":"iaf-chetak-flying-elephant-republic-day-116-helicopter-unit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/iaf-chetak-flying-elephant-republic-day-116-helicopter-unit\/","title":{"rendered":"The Indian Air Force Flew a Helicopter Dressed as an Elephant"},"content":{"rendered":"<style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style>\r\n<p>Somewhere in the 1970s, on a January morning in New Delhi, an elephant flew down Rajpath.<\/p>\r\n<p>It was a HAL Chetak, the Indian licence-built version of the French A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III, belonging to No. 116 Helicopter Unit of the Indian Air Force. A tailor had spent two to three weeks covering it in fabric: a trunk, two enormous ears, a pair of tusks, four hollow legs and a caparison of the kind a ceremonial elephant wears. The cockpit was almost entirely enclosed, leaving the pilot a pair of slits to see through.<\/p>\r\n<p>He then flew it down the parade route and made it dance.<\/p>\r\n<p>It is worth seeing before reading any further. The photographs below are the ones that circulate whenever this story resurfaces, and they are not a composite or a model: the elephant is a Chetak with a rotor turning above it.<\/p>\n\n\r\n<div style=\"margin:24px 0;display:flex;justify-content:center\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DdPTQG5ShCF\/embed\/\" style=\"width:100%;max-width:540px;height:1000px;border:0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowtransparency=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\n\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f5f5f5;padding:18px 20px;margin:26px 0\"><h3 style=\"margin:0 0 10px;font-size:20px\">Quick Facts<\/h3><table style=\"width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;font-size:15px\"><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Aircraft<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">HAL Chetak, the Indian licence-built A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Unit<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">No. 116 Helicopter Unit, Indian Air Force<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Pilot<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">Group Captain Brij Mohan Datta, who commanded the unit (spellings of the name vary between sources)<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Costume<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">Fabric panels sewn by a tailor brought to the air base, two to three weeks of work<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Speed flown<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">About 40 to 45 knots, and never above about 60 knots (110 km\/h)<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Why so slow<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">Faster and the fabric tears away, or goes into the tail rotor<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Display<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">Descended over Rajpath, danced for roughly five to seven minutes, then climbed to clear India Gate<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Other costumes<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">A giant fish, and in 1993 a dodo flown in Mauritius<\/td><\/tr><tr><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee;font-weight:600;width:38%;vertical-align:top\">Dates<\/td><td style=\"padding:8px 14px;border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee\">Genuinely uncertain. See below<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/iaf-hal-chetak-helicopter.jpg\" alt=\"An Indian Air Force HAL Chetak helicopter\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">An Indian Air Force HAL Chetak, the licence-built Alouette III and the aircraft underneath the elephant. Photo: Shadman Samee, CC BY-SA 2.0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The aircraft under the costume<\/h2>\r\n<p>The Chetak is not an Indian design. It is the A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III, a French light utility helicopter that first flew in 1959, built under licence by Hindustan Aeronautics from the mid-1960s. India named it after the warhorse ridden by Maharana Pratap at the battle of Haldighati in 1576, which tells you something about how the type was regarded.<\/p>\r\n<p>It earned it. HAL built more than 300 for the Indian Air Force alone, and Chetaks and their Cheetah cousins have spent sixty years doing the jobs nobody else wanted: casualty evacuation, mountain resupply, flying fuel to Indian research stations in Antarctica, and landing on helipads on the Siachen Glacier at altitudes where most helicopters cannot hover. Several hundred remain in Indian service across the three armed forces.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/aerospatiale-alouette-iii-helicopter.jpg\" alt=\"An Aerospatiale Alouette III helicopter in flight\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">The French A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III, first flown in 1959, which HAL built in India as the Chetak. Photo: Mike McBey, CC BY 2.0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Why 45 knots<\/h2>\r\n<p>The speed limit is the most revealing number in the whole story, because it is the point where the costume stops being a joke and becomes a flight-safety problem.<\/p>\r\n<p>A helicopter covered in loose fabric has two ways to kill you. The first is simple: at speed the airflow rips the panels off, which at best ruins the display over a crowd of hundreds of thousands and at worst drops a sheet of cloth on the parade. The second is worse. A panel that tears partly free can be drawn into the tail rotor. A tail rotor strike on a single-rotor helicopter at low level over a city street does not have a good outcome.<\/p>\r\n<p>So the pilot flew it at roughly 40 to 45 knots and kept well clear of 60, which is walking pace by helicopter standards, with almost no forward visibility, in front of the largest audience in the country. The accounts that survive are consistent on that constraint even where they disagree on everything else.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/UK2HvcsZHtg\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">What is actually documented, and what is not<\/h2>\r\n<p>This is a story that has been retold enough times to acquire details it may not have earned, so it is worth separating the two.<\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Well attested:<\/strong> the aircraft was a Chetak of No. 116 Helicopter Unit. The costume was fabric, made by a tailor at the base. The pilot most often named is Group Captain Brij Mohan Datta, who commanded the unit. The speed was held around 40 to 45 knots for the reasons above. There was also a fish, and in 1993 a dodo flown in Mauritius, where several Chetaks had been sold and where the police force still operates Alouette IIIs.<\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Not well attested:<\/strong> the dates. Versions circulating online give confident year ranges, commonly 1970 to 1973 and again 1979 to 1985. No source we could find supports those. Aerotime and Vintage News Daily, which have both looked at the photographs, say the origin date is uncertain, note 1977 as one claim among several, and place the famous display simply somewhere in the 1970s.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #ef6c00;padding:20px 24px;margin:26px 0\"><p style=\"font-size:19px;line-height:1.6;font-style:italic;margin:0 0 10px;color:#0d1117\">&ldquo;Unusual helicopters don&rsquo;t show up in other Republic Day parades in the late 1970s and the 1980s.&rdquo;<\/p><p style=\"font-size:14px;color:#555;margin:0\"><strong>Vintage News Daily<\/strong>, on the difficulty of pinning down when the costumed Chetaks actually flew<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>There is a second wrinkle. No. 116 Helicopter Unit formed in 1967 on the Mil Mi-4 and, by Wikipedia&rsquo;s account of the unit, did not receive Alouette IIIs until December 1973. If that is right, an elephant flown by that unit on that aircraft cannot date from 1970. The tidy year ranges being shared this week are the least reliable part of the story.<\/p>\r\n<p>One more number deserves a footnote. Several accounts, including the Madras Courier, say the helicopter descended to about 910 feet over Rajpath and danced for five to seven minutes. Another account puts it at ten feet above the ground. Those cannot both be right, and 910 feet is an oddly precise figure to have survived fifty years, so treat it as a repeated claim rather than a measurement.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/chetak-helicopter-antarctica-dakshin-gangotri.jpg\" alt=\"An Indian Chetak helicopter ferrying fuel in Antarctica\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">A Chetak ferrying fuel to the Dakshin Gangotri station in Antarctica. The type that danced over Delhi also worked in some of the hardest places on earth. Photo: Pavan Nair, CC BY-SA 4.0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The fish and the dodo<\/h2>\r\n<p>The elephant was not a one-off idea. A Chetak was also dressed as a giant fish, reportedly seen at Goa, which at least had the advantage of a shape closer to a helicopter&rsquo;s.<\/p>\r\n<p>The dodo is the best of them. Mauritius bought Chetaks from India, and the Mauritius Police Force helicopter squadron, which has flown Alouette IIIs since 1974 and still does, put one in a dodo costume for the country&rsquo;s independence celebrations in 1993. A flightless bird, extinct since the seventeenth century, reconstructed in fabric over a French helicopter built in India, flying over the island it died on.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #6a1b9a;padding:20px 24px;margin:26px 0\"><p style=\"font-size:19px;line-height:1.6;font-style:italic;margin:0 0 10px;color:#0d1117\">&ldquo;The name Chetak refers to the sixteenth-century warhorse of Maharana Pratap, a symbol of devotion, bravery and resistance to occupation.&rdquo;<\/p><p style=\"font-size:14px;color:#555;margin:0\"><strong>Aerotime<\/strong>, on the naming of the Indian-built Alouette III<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Why nobody does this any more<\/h2>\r\n<p>The obvious answer is safety culture, and it is not the wrong answer. No modern air force is going to sign off on wrapping a single-engine helicopter in loose cloth and flying it low over a crowd of hundreds of thousands with the pilot looking through slits. The risk assessment writes itself, and it says no.<\/p>\r\n<p>But something is lost with it. Republic Day flypasts today are formations of Rafales and Tejas and Apaches, which are impressive in the way a weapons system is impressive. An air force that sent a dancing elephant down the ceremonial avenue of its capital was saying something else entirely, and it was saying it with a pilot who had to be very good indeed to get away with it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/GPexC1iO91Y\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The post going round<\/h2>\r\n<p>The version that brought this back, embedded at the top of this article, comes from the account historyfeels. It gets the substance right: the unit, the tailor, the speed limit, the tail rotor risk, the fish and the dodo. The year ranges are the part to hold loosely, and the 910-foot figure is inherited from earlier retellings rather than from a record.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<style>.mfq{margin:34px 0 8px}.mfq h2{font:26px\/1.3 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117;padding-top:22px;margin:0 0 6px}.mfq .qa details{border-top:1px solid #5C91FF;margin:0;padding:0}.mfq .qa details:last-of-type{border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee}.mfq .qa summary{cursor:pointer;list-style:none;display:flex;justify-content:space-between;align-items:center;gap:16px;padding:22px 26px;font:18px\/1.7 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117}.mfq .qa summary::-webkit-details-marker{display:none}.mfq .qa summary::after{content:\"+\";font:24px Helvetica,sans-serif;color:#3568e0;flex:0 0 auto}.mfq .qa details[open] summary::after{content:\"\\2013\"}.mfq .qa details:hover summary{color:#3568e0}.mfq .qa .a{font:16px\/1.7 \"Gilroy regular\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#454e5e;padding:0 26px 24px}.mfq .qa .a a{color:#3568e0}@media(max-width:680px){.mfq .qa summary{padding:18px 14px;font-size:17px}.mfq .qa .a{padding:0 14px 20px}}<\/style>\r\n\r\n\r\n<section class=\"mfq\"><h2>Frequently Asked Questions<\/h2><div class=\"qa\"><details open><summary>Did the Indian Air Force really fly a helicopter dressed as an elephant?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Yes. A HAL Chetak of No. 116 Helicopter Unit was covered in fabric panels forming a trunk, ears, tusks and legs, and flown over the Republic Day parade route in New Delhi during the 1970s. The costume was made by a tailor brought to the air base, and the pilot flew with almost no forward visibility through narrow slits left in the covering.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>What helicopter was the Indian flying elephant?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">A HAL Chetak, which is the French A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III built under licence in India by Hindustan Aeronautics. The Alouette III first flew in 1959 and HAL produced more than 300 Chetaks for the Indian Air Force. The name comes from the warhorse ridden by Maharana Pratap at the battle of Haldighati in 1576.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Why did the elephant helicopter fly so slowly?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Because of the fabric. At higher speeds the airflow could tear the panels away, and a partly detached panel could be drawn into the tail rotor, which on a single-rotor helicopter at low level over a crowd would be catastrophic. Accounts agree the pilot held roughly 40 to 45 knots and stayed below about 60 knots, or 110 km\/h.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Which years did the flying elephant appear at Republic Day?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">This is genuinely uncertain and the confident year ranges circulating online are not well supported. Sources that have examined the photographs place the famous display somewhere in the 1970s and note 1977 as one claim among several. No. 116 Helicopter Unit is also recorded as receiving Alouette IIIs only in December 1973, which argues against the earliest dates sometimes given.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Who flew the elephant helicopter?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The pilot usually named is Group Captain Brij Mohan Datta, who commanded No. 116 Helicopter Unit, although the spelling of his name differs between accounts. The display involved descending over Rajpath, performing a short dance of roughly five to seven minutes, then climbing away to clear India Gate.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Were other helicopters dressed up as animals?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Yes. A Chetak was also costumed as a giant fish, reportedly at Goa. In 1993 the Mauritius Police Force, which had acquired Chetaks from India, dressed one as a dodo for the country&rsquo;s independence celebrations. The Mauritian police helicopter squadron has flown Alouette IIIs since 1974 and still operates the type.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Is the Chetak still in service?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Yes. Several hundred Chetak and Cheetah helicopters remain in service across the Indian Air Force, Army and Navy. Despite the design dating to the 1950s, the type is still used for casualty evacuation, mountain resupply, Antarctic support flights and operations at extreme altitude on the Siachen Glacier, where few helicopters can hover.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Would an air force do this today?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Almost certainly not. Wrapping a single-engine helicopter in loose fabric, obscuring the pilot&rsquo;s view and flying it at low level over a crowd of hundreds of thousands would not pass any modern flight-safety review. The displays belong to an era with a different tolerance for risk in ceremonial flying.<\/div><\/details><\/div><\/section>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@type\":\"FAQPage\",\"mainEntity\":[{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Did the Indian Air Force really fly a helicopter dressed as an elephant?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Yes. A HAL Chetak of No. 116 Helicopter Unit was covered in fabric panels forming a trunk, ears, tusks and legs, and flown over the Republic Day parade route in New Delhi during the 1970s. The costume was made by a tailor brought to the air base, and the pilot flew with almost no forward visibility through narrow slits left in the covering.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"What helicopter was the Indian flying elephant?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"A HAL Chetak, which is the French A\u00e9rospatiale Alouette III built under licence in India by Hindustan Aeronautics. The Alouette III first flew in 1959 and HAL produced more than 300 Chetaks for the Indian Air Force. The name comes from the warhorse ridden by Maharana Pratap at the battle of Haldighati in 1576.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Why did the elephant helicopter fly so slowly?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Because of the fabric. At higher speeds the airflow could tear the panels away, and a partly detached panel could be drawn into the tail rotor, which on a single-rotor helicopter at low level over a crowd would be catastrophic. Accounts agree the pilot held roughly 40 to 45 knots and stayed below about 60 knots, or 110 km\/h.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Which years did the flying elephant appear at Republic Day?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"This is genuinely uncertain and the confident year ranges circulating online are not well supported. Sources that have examined the photographs place the famous display somewhere in the 1970s and note 1977 as one claim among several. No. 116 Helicopter Unit is also recorded as receiving Alouette IIIs only in December 1973, which argues against the earliest dates sometimes given.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Who flew the elephant helicopter?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"The pilot usually named is Group Captain Brij Mohan Datta, who commanded No. 116 Helicopter Unit, although the spelling of his name differs between accounts. The display involved descending over Rajpath, performing a short dance of roughly five to seven minutes, then climbing away to clear India Gate.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Were other helicopters dressed up as animals?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Yes. A Chetak was also costumed as a giant fish, reportedly at Goa. In 1993 the Mauritius Police Force, which had acquired Chetaks from India, dressed one as a dodo for the country\u2019s independence celebrations. The Mauritian police helicopter squadron has flown Alouette IIIs since 1974 and still operates the type.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Is the Chetak still in service?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Yes. Several hundred Chetak and Cheetah helicopters remain in service across the Indian Air Force, Army and Navy. Despite the design dating to the 1950s, the type is still used for casualty evacuation, mountain resupply, Antarctic support flights and operations at extreme altitude on the Siachen Glacier, where few helicopters can hover.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Would an air force do this today?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Almost certainly not. Wrapping a single-engine helicopter in loose fabric, obscuring the pilot\u2019s view and flying it at low level over a crowd of hundreds of thousands would not pass any modern flight-safety review. The displays belong to an era with a different tolerance for risk in ceremonial flying.\"}}]}<\/script><p style=\"font-size:14px;color:#777;font-style:italic;margin-top:28px\">Sources: Madras Courier; LiveHistoryIndia; Aerotime; Vintage News Daily; autoevolution; Wikipedia entries for No. 116 Helicopter Unit and the A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III; historyfeels on Instagram; Afterburner reporting<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f0f4ff;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF;padding:18px 22px;margin:28px 0\"><h3 style=\"margin:0 0 8px;font-size:19px\">Related Posts<\/h3><ul style=\"margin:0;padding-left:20px\"><li style=\"margin:6px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/sepecat-jaguar-india-last-operator-shamsher\/\">The Cold War Jet Only India Still Flies<\/a><\/li><li style=\"margin:6px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/morphing-wing-afti-f-111-mission-adaptive-wing-acte-airbus-2026\/\">The Morphing Wing Already Flew, in 1985, on an F-111<\/a><\/li><li style=\"margin:6px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/bell-x-5-first-variable-sweep-wing-flight\/\">Bell X-5: The First Wing to Sweep in Flight<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Somewhere in the 1970s, on a January morning in New Delhi, an elephant flew down Rajpath. It was a HAL Chetak, the Indian licence-built version of the French A&eacute;rospatiale Alouette III, belonging to No. 116 Helicopter Unit of the Indian Air Force. A tailor had spent two to three weeks covering it in fabric: a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":22512640,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[665,666],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22513212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aviation-world","category-history-and-legends"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Indian Air Force Flew a Helicopter Dressed as an Elephant | MiGFlug<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A HAL Chetak of No. 116 Helicopter Unit flew over Republic Day as a fabric elephant at 45 knots. 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