Iqbal’s Shaheen And Paf’s Wings Of Resolve
Iqbal’s Shaheen And Paf’s Wings Of Resolve
Written by: Izmi Herlani
One of the most enduring influences on the spirit of Pakistan Air Force came not from a military strategist or an aviation pioneer, but from a poet, Dr Allama Muhammad Iqbal. His poetry offers neither the comfort of easy praise nor the promise of effortless greatness. It demands courage, self-belief and relentless endeavour. Its promise is exacting: we need not remain confined by the limits we inherit, but we must earn the heights we seek. For PAF, that promise takes wing in Iqbal’s Shaheen, high-flying, keen-eyed, restless in spirit and sustained by its own strength. As Pakistan commemorates the poet’s 149th birth anniversary, the question is not simply how deeply we admire his vision, but how faithfully we live it.
تو شاہیں ہے پرواز ہے کام تیرا
ترے سامنے آسماں اور بھی ہیں
Iqbal does not ask the Shaheen to admire its wings. He challenges it to use them. Beyond achievement lies another horizon; beyond recognition, another responsibility. Yesterday’s accomplishment must never become tomorrow’s excuse. Here, inspiration meets its test: aspiration must become preparation, confidence must become competence and pride must answer to duty.
The Shaheen’s qualities give that pursuit its discipline. High flight demands high purpose; keen sight suggests foresight. Its restless spirit rejects stagnation, while its solitary struggle speaks of endurance and self-reliance. Together, these qualities offer an uncompromising ideal: strength earned through effort, not distinction borrowed from privilege.
That ideal has a contemporary institutional expression in PAF’s modernization and indigenization drive under Air Chief Marshal Zaheer Ahmed Baber Sidhu. Describing a transition towards a “Next Generation Air Force”, the Air Chief has outlined changes in operational doctrine and the induction of capabilities in Kinetic domains, Unmanned Systems, Electronic Warfare, and Space & Cyber capabilities. The stated ambition reaches beyond individual platforms towards a connected, Multi-Domain Force.
The connection with Iqbal is not in the terminology. It is in the refusal to stand still. An institution honours that spirit when it encourages inquiry, rewards initiative and prepares its people for challenges that yesterday’s methods cannot answer.
For every young Shaheen, the blue uniform therefore marks both an arrival and a beginning. Selection opens the door; character determines what follows. The aircraft commands the gaze, but the instructor’s patience, the engineer’s ingenuity, the technician’s precision and the fighter pilot’s preparation make flight possible. There is patriotism in exactness. There is honour in work done faithfully when no one is watching.
نہیں تیرا نشیمن قصر سلطانی کے گنبد پر
تو شاہیں ہے بسیرا کر پہاڑوں کی چٹانوں میں
The palace offers comfort. The mountain demands endurance. Iqbal places the Shaheen on the rock, not beneath the gilded dome: stature must be earned, not bestowed. For the Men in Blue, the lesson is not hardship for their own sake. It is the refusal to let convenience outrank duty.
That distinction gives remembrance its purpose. The courage of Air Commodore M M Alam, Squadron Leader Sarfaraz Rafiqui (Shaheed) and Pilot Officer Rashid Minhas (Shaheed) places a demanding inheritance before succeeding generations. The remembrance of 1965 and 1971 Indo-Pak wars & Operation Swift Retort carries its own call to readiness. A legacy is not a shelter beneath which to rest. It is a standard to carry forward.
During the conflict of May 2025, one of the largest Beyond-Visual-Range aerial engagements of the 21st century, PAF demonstrated the significance of preparation, coordination and effective employment of technology. Its success in the air battle included independently corroborated Indian aircraft losses, among them 04 Rafale, 01 MiG-29, 01 Mirage 2000, a Su-30 MKI and a Heron UAV worth nearly USD 09 million. Additionally, the breach of Indian Air Defence Shield in the shape of destruction of 02x S-400 Air Defence Systems speaks volumes of PAF’s professional prowess.
The strategic lesson extends beyond a tally of aircraft and equipment lost by the enemy. Modern air combat demands that detection, tracking, decision-making and engagement work together. The Shaheen’s keen vision finds a contemporary parallel in situational awareness: seeing the threat, understanding its significance and acting before the opportunity passes.
The Air Chief has described PAF’s transformation in terms of a home-grown, Multi-Domain Kill Chain, bringing Unmanned Systems, Electronic Warfare, Space and Cyber assets into its operational approach by prioritizing indigenization through National Aerospace Science and Technology Parks. In that stated vision, strength rests not in an aircraft alone, but in the coordinated capabilities behind it.
Iqbal’s poetry does not explain a missile’s trajectory or establish a combat result. It speaks to the human discipline behind capability: the willingness to learn, the composure to judge and the resolve to act. Achievement must deepen that discipline, not diminish it. The Shaheen cannot remain aloft on yesterday’s flight.
با مقامی در نمی سازیم و بس
ما سراپا ذوق پروازیم و بس
The impulse here is unmistakable: no station is final while the desire for flight endures. For the professional, that means remaining teachable after success, inquisitive after qualification and alert after recognition. Knowledge loses its power when its possessor decides there is nothing left to learn.
The National Aerospace Science and Technology Parks initiative brings a practical dimension to this pursuit. By seeking to connect industry, academia and government across aerospace and emerging technologies, NASTP spearheaded by Pakistan Air Force, places research and innovation within the larger ambition of national capability. Its deepest promise lies in the people and institutions able to turn an idea into a working system and to improve, sustain and eventually replace it.
The JF-17 Thunder offers another expression of that ambition through indigenization at Pakistan Aeronautical Complex. Self-reliance is built through such cumulative work: a design refined, a process mastered, a difficult problem solved. Its foundations lie as much in workshops and laboratories as in the aircraft that finally takes to the sky.
And the summons reaches beyond any PAF Air Base. To the young Pakistani Shaheen looking upwards, the first instrument of ascent may be a book, a skill or a question pursued with patience. The future needs those who can fly, but also those who can teach, design, build and discover. Each has a part in making national ambition real.
This Iqbal Day, let remembrance become resolve: excellence in uniform, integrity at work and purpose in youth. Let the child watching an aircraft cross the sky see more than the splendor of flight. Let that child recognize what learning, discipline and courage can make possible and find the resolve to begin.
نہیں ہے ناامید اقبالؔ اپنی کشتِ ویراں سے
ذرا نم ہو تو یہ مٹی بہت زرخیز ہے ساقی
