LAHORE: The ‘1965 War Hero’ Muhammad Mahmood Alam, popularly known as M.M. Alam, is being remembered on his 86th birth anniversary.
The legendary war hero’s record of shooting down five Indian war planes in less than a minute remain unbeaten. Alam, nicknamed as ‘Little Dragon’ popularly, while piloting an F-86 Sabre, shot down five Indian war planes in less than a minute during 1965 Pak-India war and altogether downed nine warplanes in the aerial fight.
MM Alam was the first-ever fighter pilot for PAF listed on top in the Hall of Fame list at the PAF Museum in Karachi. Alam is considered as a national hero for Pakistan for his remarkable show of brilliance in the war of 1965
He was born on July 6, 1935, in Calcutta, British India and was the eldest of 11 siblings. He was the first member of his family to join the military against their wishes.
In 1965, when India started war in the late mist dark night, Alam who was the first commanding officer of the first squadron of Assaults Mirage III, took his F-86 Sabre jet plane equipped with AIM-9 sidewinder missiles and fly over the skies of Sargodha to defeat the enemies who entered Pakistani airspace.
MM Alam made history by knocking down nine Indian fighter jet ‘Hawker Hunters’ in air-to-air combat despite superiority over F-86. He shot down and set an unbeaten world record by downing five Indian aircraft in thirty seconds. He was battling illness and passed away in Karachi on March 18, 2013 at the age of 77. He retired in 1982 as an Air Commodore.
