Abhinandan Varthaman
officer in the Indian Air Force
Group Captain Abhinandan Varthaman VrC (born 21 June 1983) is an Indian Air Force officer and fighter pilot. He flew a MiG-21 Bison during an aerial engagement on 27 February 2019, when his aircraft was shot down by the Pakistan Air Force. He was captured by the Pakistan Army after landing in Pakistani territory, approximately 7 km (4.3 miles) from the Line of Control. On 1 March 2019, he was released and returned to India.
Career and personal life
Abhinandan Varthaman was born on 21 June 1983 in a Tamil Jain family, in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. His family is from Thirupanamoor, a village about 19 km (12 miles) from Kanchipuram. His father, Simhakutty Varthaman is retired Air Marshal, and his mother is a doctor.
Varthaman was educated at Sainik School, Amaravathinagar. He graduated from the National Defence Academy and was commissioned into the combat (fighter) stream of the IAF as a flying officer on 19 June 2004. He was trained at the IAF centres in Bathinda and Halwara, promoted to flight lieutenant on 19 June 2006, and to squadron leader on 8 July 2010.
“Abhinandan Varthaman” enters the record as officer in the Indian Air Force. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Abhinandan, Varthaman and officer can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q61926955. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1983, 2019, 2004 and 2006.
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This entry incorporates text from “Abhinandan Varthaman” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.