S R K Nair

Air Marshal Sreedhara Panicker Radha Krishnan Nair (born 7 July 1958), PVSM, AVSM, VM, Mention in Dispatches is a retired officer of Indian Air Force who was Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief (AOC-in-C), Training Command of the Indian Air Force from 1 September 2015 to 31 July 2018. He succeeded Air Marshal Ramesh Rai.

Early life and education Nair was born on 7 July 1958 at Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. He is an alumnus of Loyola School, Thiruvananthapuram and National Defence Academy, Pune. He captained a flight to the North Pole in an Indian Air Force (IAF) IL-76 aircraft on 20 Jun 2003, making it the first Indian aircraft to fly over the true North pole. He played a pivotal role in operationalising Daulet Beg Oldi, the highest air strip in the world, for An-32 and C-130 aircraft. He was involved in numerous disaster relief operations during the 2001 Gujarat earthquake, Super cyclone in Orissa, 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, Mumbai Floods, Cyclone Katrina, China Earthquake and was the Air Force co-ordinator for Operation Rahat. He is a qualified Flying Instructor, has been an Air Force Examiner and is the Commodore Commandant of 44 Squadron (Mighty Jets). He joined the Armed Forces Tribunal as an Administrative Member at the Kochi Bench on 15 September 2020.

Awards and medals During 38 years of his career, Nair has been awarded several medals: AOC-in-C Commendation, Chief of the Air Staff Commendation, GOC-in-C Commendation, Mention-in-Despatch (1999), the Vayu Sena Medal (2005), the Ati Vishisht Seva Medal (January 2010) and the Param Vishisht Seva Medal (January 2017).

Personal life He is married to Geethanjali Nair and their daughter Karthika Nair (Director & Head of Operations, Praesedia Biotherapeutics Pvt. Ltd.) is married to Manu Balachandran, Deputy Editor, Forbes India.