UNIVERSITY OF MACHINES

The ACC&S and the MIC&S are leaders of mechanical knowledge with a hands-on training approach

- WORDS ANIRJIT HORE PHOTOGRAPHY ANIS SHAIKH & SUMIT GAIKWAD

I used to play football a lot as a child, and well into my adulthood, and my jersey number read 27. Not an iconic 7 or 10 like the legends, but 27, and I kid you not, I was a decent left winger. There was something special about that number that clicked for the 14-year-old me. This year, Overdrive completes 27 years, and somehow these two digits took me back and made me smile. And as my fate would have it, I embarked on a journey to experience a tiny bit of a life that only a chosen, courageous few get to live.

The beginning of the story dates back to 1924, with the establishment of the Royal Tank Corps School at Ahmednagar, now Ahilyanagar in Maharashtra. The British established school consisted of a driving and maintenance section, which trained crews on the Crossley, Rolls Royce, and Guy armoured cars and a Gunnery Section, which carried out training on the weapons mounted on these vehicles. In 1938, the mechanisation of the Indian Cavalry began, which today has evolved to form one of the most advanced and formidable armies on the planet, one we hold in the highest regard and utmost respect, the Indian Army.

Overdrive, celebrating its anniversary with the most fearsome vehicles in the country, couldn't get any bigger than this, the add-on being living at the campus of an army institute. That's all I needed to hear before saying yes, and after this entire journey, I realised how unfortunate it would've been if I had missed this. My perspective on this story is from the learner's point of view, and this led me to ACC&S, the Armoured Corps Centre and School. Being the forerunner in mechanised armour training in the Indian Army’s gigantic kitty of institutes across the country, the school attracts hundreds of budding Jawans every year, interested to join the Armoured Corps.