The Air Force School (TAFS), formerly known as Air Force Central School (AFCS), was set up primarily to provide education to the children of
Indian Air Force
The Indian Air Force (IAF) is the air arm of the Indian Armed Forces. Its complement of personnel and aircraft assets ranks third amongst the air forces of the world. Its primary mission is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct aerial w ...
personnel.
It was founded in 1955 by the
Air Marshal Subroto Mukherjee
Air Marshal Subroto Mukerjee OBE (Bengali: সুব্রত মুখোপাধ্যায়) (5 March 1911 – 8 November 1960) was an Indian military officer who was the first Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the Indian Air Force. He wa ...
, the Chief of Air Staff. It was established in temporary wartime barracks at Wellingdon Camp, Club Road,
New Delhi
New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...
on 18 July 1955 to educate children of
Officers
An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," fro ...
and
Airmen
An airman is a member of an air force or air arm of a nation's armed forces. In certain air forces, it can also refer to a specific enlisted rank. An airman can also be referred as a soldier in other definitions.
In civilian aviation usage, t ...
of the Indian Air Force. In May 1967, the school shifted to its present location Aravali Campus location in Subroto Park,
Delhi Cantonment; it had been located in New Delhi near the present residence of the Prime Minister. The school celebrated its
Silver Jubilee in 1980 when the word "Central" was dropped from the name. The school is a co-educational public institute affiliated to the
Central Board of Secondary Education
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is a national level board of education in India for public and private schools, controlled and managed by the Government of India. Established in 1929 by a resolution of the government, the Board ...
(CBSE). It has boarding facilities for boys of classes VI to XII. It has classes from
Kindergarten
Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cent ...
to
Class XII. The school is situated on the Aravali ridge.
The school has an auditorium named as Aravali Hall. There are two separate 'wings' in the school. The junior wing has classes Kindergarten to V. The senior wing has classes VI to XII.
Although the school was established primarily for the benefit of children belonging to the IAF personnel, it has always been open to wards of
Army
An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...
and
Navy
A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral zone, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and ...
personnel as well as to civilians.
The school, and its sister schools,
Air Force Bal Bharati School
Air Force Bal Bharati School (AFBBS) established 1955, is a senior secondary school situated on Lodi Road, New Delhi, India, and run by the Indian Air Force Educational and Cultural Society. It is affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Edu ...
(AFBBS) and the
Air Force Golden Jubilee Institute
Air Force Golden Jubilee Institute, located at Subroto Park, Delhi Cantonment, India, is a school run by the Indian Air Force Educational and Cultural Society. It was founded in 1985.
The school has an auditorium named as Rabindralaya. There are ...
(AFGJI) are run by the
Indian Air Force
The Indian Air Force (IAF) is the air arm of the Indian Armed Forces. Its complement of personnel and aircraft assets ranks third amongst the air forces of the world. Its primary mission is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct aerial w ...
Educational and Cultural Society.
Management
The Managing Committee of the school is headed by the Joint Director of Education of the Directorate of Education, Air Headquarters (R.K. Puram) New Delhi. The Committee consists of some officers of the Indian Air Force and two elected representatives of the teaching staff; one elected representative of the parents, two nominated members each of the Directorate of Education, Delhi Administration and of the Education Advisory Board, Delhi Administration. The Board of Governors, presided over by the Air Officer in charge of Administration, Air Headquarters is the body for all the schools run by the IAF Education Society. The Vice Principal looks after the academics, assisted by the Headmistress of the Junior Wing and the Head of the Department of each faculty. The Administrative Officer cum Bursar and the Accountant, look after the accounts, administration and management.
Affiliations
The Air Force School is a
co-educational
Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to t ...
public school
Public school may refer to:
* State school (known as a public school in many countries), a no-fee school, publicly funded and operated by the government
* Public school (United Kingdom), certain elite fee-charging independent schools in England an ...
. The school is affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education and students are prepared for the
All India Secondary School Examination
All India Secondary School Examination, commonly known as board exams, is a centralized public examination that students in schools affiliated with the Central Board of Secondary Education in India take after class 10. The board conducts the ex ...
(Class X) and the
All India Senior School Certificate Examination
The All India Senior School Certificate Examination (AISSCE) also called Class 12 Board Exams in common language, is the final examination conducted every year for high school students by the Central Board of Secondary Education on behalf of the ...
(Class XII). The School is a member of the Indian Public Schools' Conference (IPSC) and also of National Progressive Schools' Conference (NPSC).
Notable alumni
*
Anoop Malhotra (Lt. General, Indian Army)
*
Ashok Malhotra (Professor, University of British Columbia)
*
Nikesh Arora
Nikesh Arora (born February 9, 1968) is an Indian-American business executive. Arora was formerly a senior executive at Google. He served as the president of SoftBank Group from October 2014 to June 2016. On June 1, 2018, Arora took on the role ...
(CEO, Palo Alto Networks, previously, President & COO of
SoftBank
is a Japanese multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo which focuses on investment management. The Group primarily invests in companies operating in technology, energy, and financial sectors. It also runs the ...
Corp and SVP and Chief Business Officer,
Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
)
*
Pawanexh Kohli
Pawanexh Kohli is the founding Chief Executive of India's National Centre for Cold-chain Development (NCCD), the premier think-tank in agri-logistics set up in public-private-partnership mode in 2012, and from 2012 to 2020 was the Chief Advisor ...
(Chief Advisor,
National Centre for Cold-chain Development
The National Centre for Cold-chain Development (NCCD) is an autonomous think tank body established by the Government of India with an agenda to positively impact and promote the development of the cold-chain sector in the country. NCCD was regis ...
, GOI)
*
Rakesh Sharma
Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma, AC (born 13 January 1949) is a former Indian Air Force pilot who flew aboard Soyuz T-11 on 3 April 1984 as part of the Soviet Interkosmos programme. He is the only Indian citizen to travel in space, although ...
(Movie Director, Film Maker)
*
Rini Simon Khanna
Rini Khanna (born 1964) is an Indian television news anchor, who worked with state-run Doordarshan (1985 – 2001) which made her well known, and later started a career as voiceover professional and anchor person for various events. She started ...
(News Anchor)
*
Vijay Shankar (Retd.) (Vice Admiral, Indian Navy)
*
Kavery Nambisan
Kavery Nambisan is an Indian surgeon and novelist. Her career in medicine has been a strong influence in her fiction.
Life
Kavery Nambisan was born in Palangala village in south Kodagu, India, in a politician's family. Her father, C.M. Poonac ...
(Surgeon and writer)
*
Subrahmanyam Jaishankar (
Minister of External Affairs In many countries, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the government department responsible for the state's diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral relations affairs as well as for providing support for a country's citizens who are abroad. The entit ...
)
*
Parvez Dewan
Parvez Dewan is an Indian administrator, author and librettist (lyricist). He is an Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officer of Jammu and Kashmir cadre. He became Secretary of the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs in 2011, and also the c ...
(
Indian Administrative Service
The Indian Administrative Service (IAS) is the administrative arm of the All India Services of Government of India. Considered the premier civil service of India, the IAS is one of the three arms of the All India Services along with the Indian ...
J&K Cadre. Secretary, India Tourism)
*
Kabir Sadanand
Kabir Sadanand is an Indian actor
An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and televis ...
(Movie Director and Producer)
*
Mohammad Jawed
Mohammad Jawed is an Indian politician. He was elected to the Lok Sabha, lower house of the Parliament of India from Kishanganj constituency in the 2019 Indian general election as member of the Indian National Congress.
Early life
Mohammad ...
(Member of Parliament,
Kishanganj
Kishanganj is a city and district headquarters of Kishanganj district in Purnia division of Bihar state.
History
Kishanganj, which was previously part of Purnia district, is part of the Mithila region.
Mithila first gained prominence after bei ...
)
*
Aparna Sharma
Aparna Sharma (born 23 July 1990) is an Indian model-turned-actress. She was born in Lucknow and brought up in several parts of India. Sharma completed her secondary education from The Air Force School, Delhi, and her graduation from Delhi Un ...
(model, actress)
Programmes
The school offers four main streams -
Humanities
Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture. In the Renaissance, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, the main area of secular study in universities at the t ...
, Commerce, Science (Medical) and Science (Non-medical). Besides
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
and Physical Education, subjects offered are:
* Humanities: Mathematics, Applied Mathematics, Economics, History, Geography, Political Science, Psychology, Home Science, Informatics Practices.
* Commerce: Accountancy, Business Studies, Economics, Mathematics, Applied Mathematics, Geography, Home Science, Informatics Practices.
* Science (Medical): Mathematics, Applied Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Home Science, Psychology, Informatics Practices.
* Science (Non-medical): Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics.
The school site, known as Aravali campus, is situated at the Aravali Ridge. The 100 yards campus includes instructional blocks, laboratories and an SUPW activities complex; a music division, staff quarters and a boarding house. The school sickbay functions under the supervision of a Resident Medical Officer and a Resident Medical Assistant. The medical staff, besides providing medical assistance to the students, conduct annual medical check ups.
The school conducts classes in activities under
Socially Useful Productive Work
Socially Useful Productive Work (SUPW) is a "purposive productive work and services related to the needs of the child and the community, which will be proved meaningful to the learner. Such work must not be performed mechanically but must include p ...
(SUPW) : music - instrumental and vocal, dance, painting, sculpture, wood work, electronics and journalism. The school has societies and clubs with a teacher in-charge for each. These include Wild Life and Nature Club, Photography, Science, and Music. In the Home Science department boys are trained in household activities and House Maintenance,
Home Economics
Home economics, also called domestic science or family and consumer sciences, is a subject concerning human development, personal and family finances, consumer issues, housing and interior design, nutrition and food preparation, as well as texti ...
and Nutrition.
Adjoining the school campus there are play fields for
hockey
Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...
,
cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...
, and
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
, and a 400-meter track. The
Sports Authority of India
The Sports Authority of India (SAI) is the apex national sports body of India, established in 1982 by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports of Government of India for the development of sports in India. SAI has 2 Sports Academic institution ...
has started coaching in football, hockey, and
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...
for students. Students take part in mountaineering, rock climbing, trekking and adventure camps at hill stations and
mountaineering
Mountaineering or alpinism, is a set of outdoor activities that involves ascending tall mountains. Mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas. Indoor climbing, sport climbing, a ...
institutes.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
References
External links
The Air Force School, Subroto Park websiteTAFS Alumni
{{DEFAULTSORT:Air Force School (Subroto Park)
Schools in Delhi
Boarding schools in Delhi
Educational institutions established in 1955
Indian Air Force
1955 establishments in India