<p>A paraplegic IAF officer’s real life story has inspired a group of Kolkata-based artistes, who have written a dance-drama based on the life and indomitable spirit of the deceased flying officer M P Anil Kumar, who remained a paraplegic for most of his life.<br /><br /></p>.<p>“Titled ‘Resurrection’, the dance-drama will be shown in the Air Force auditorium in Delhi on June 7,” Tinku Srivastava, principle of DPS North Calcutta and the coordinator behind the entire initiative told Deccan Herald.<br /><br />Born at Chirayinkil on the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram, M P Anil Kumar in 1988 was a strapping 24-year-old MiG-21 pilot, who was about to be posted in 3 Squadron in Pathankot after completing his training. But as fate would have it, MP — as he was popularly known — met with a motorbike accident.<br /><br />On that fateful night of June 28, the officer was returning to the mess around 11 pm when his motorbike rammed into a barrier inside the air force station. Impact of the helmet on the wooden bar wrenched his neck and broke his cervical spine.<br /><br />The accident paralysed him from the neck downwards and MP spent the remaining 25 years of his life at defence ministry’s Paraplegic Rehabilitation Centre, Pune.<br /><br />But unlike other quadriplegic individuals, the former fighter pilot bravely fought his disability from his hospital bed. First he learnt to write by holding a pen in his mouth and later, used the computer keyboard with a stylus that he held with his mouth.<br /><br />In the next several years, he wrote articles in various newspapers, magazines and websites on topics as diverse as his life and disability to Indian cricket. He maintained his own blog which fetched him admirers from all over the world. “He was like our own Christopher Reeve,” commented a MiG-21 pilot.<br /><br />MP’s life story is already part of school syllabus in Maharashtra and Kerala. “His well wishers have approached Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani to include the same in the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) curriculum,” said Air Marshal Sumit Mukerji, a former chief of the Indian Air Force's Southern Air Command in Thiruvananthapuram.<br /><br />“Since he had only two years of service, he did not receive full pension from the IAF. But MP supported his mother, sister, an autistic brother and two under-privileged children in a school with whatever money he earned from the IAF and from his writings,” said Mukerji, who was the Flight Lieutenant of the 3 Squadron when MP met with the accident.<br /></p>
<p>A paraplegic IAF officer’s real life story has inspired a group of Kolkata-based artistes, who have written a dance-drama based on the life and indomitable spirit of the deceased flying officer M P Anil Kumar, who remained a paraplegic for most of his life.<br /><br /></p>.<p>“Titled ‘Resurrection’, the dance-drama will be shown in the Air Force auditorium in Delhi on June 7,” Tinku Srivastava, principle of DPS North Calcutta and the coordinator behind the entire initiative told Deccan Herald.<br /><br />Born at Chirayinkil on the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram, M P Anil Kumar in 1988 was a strapping 24-year-old MiG-21 pilot, who was about to be posted in 3 Squadron in Pathankot after completing his training. But as fate would have it, MP — as he was popularly known — met with a motorbike accident.<br /><br />On that fateful night of June 28, the officer was returning to the mess around 11 pm when his motorbike rammed into a barrier inside the air force station. Impact of the helmet on the wooden bar wrenched his neck and broke his cervical spine.<br /><br />The accident paralysed him from the neck downwards and MP spent the remaining 25 years of his life at defence ministry’s Paraplegic Rehabilitation Centre, Pune.<br /><br />But unlike other quadriplegic individuals, the former fighter pilot bravely fought his disability from his hospital bed. First he learnt to write by holding a pen in his mouth and later, used the computer keyboard with a stylus that he held with his mouth.<br /><br />In the next several years, he wrote articles in various newspapers, magazines and websites on topics as diverse as his life and disability to Indian cricket. He maintained his own blog which fetched him admirers from all over the world. “He was like our own Christopher Reeve,” commented a MiG-21 pilot.<br /><br />MP’s life story is already part of school syllabus in Maharashtra and Kerala. “His well wishers have approached Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani to include the same in the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) curriculum,” said Air Marshal Sumit Mukerji, a former chief of the Indian Air Force's Southern Air Command in Thiruvananthapuram.<br /><br />“Since he had only two years of service, he did not receive full pension from the IAF. But MP supported his mother, sister, an autistic brother and two under-privileged children in a school with whatever money he earned from the IAF and from his writings,” said Mukerji, who was the Flight Lieutenant of the 3 Squadron when MP met with the accident.<br /></p>
