Wing Commander Kumbhapati Venu Gopala Krishna
Sastry, VSM (retd) was commissioned in June 1963.
During the 1965 Indo-Pak War, he was a Fighter
Controller in 230 SU, which played a critical role in
the conflict. He later served in various operational
Radar Signals Units, and attained the highest category
(Cat Aye) rating for Fighter Controllers. For his AD
background and professional excellence, he was specially
selected and posted to the Programming and Simulation
Centre, Bombay, on its inception in 1974, to work
with the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
(TIFR). He made a significant contribution to the
development of the operational software package for the
Automatic Data Handling System (ADHS). The
radar tracking software, the heart of the ADHS
software, developed personally by Wing Commander
Sastry, is comparable to such software available
anywhere in the world. In recognition of this immense
contribution and pioneering efforts, he was awarded the
Vishisht Seva Medal on 26 January 1985. Though he
took Premature Retirement in 1990, Wing
Commander Sastry remained involved in the
development of AD Command and Control Systems.
He was involved in the integration of four generations
of the Systems namely, the Semi-Automatic Data
Handling System (SADHS), the Fully Automatic
Data Handling System (FADHS) and finally the
Integrated Air Command and Control System
(IACCS). He was also involved in integrating
MRSAM from 2014 to 2018.
