Neha Fida Wani decided to become a pilot in childhood when she used to get fascinated by the sight of an aircraft. At just an age of 20, she got her commercial pilot’s license.
Other than Ayesha Aziz, she is the only girl from Kashmir who has achieved this feat at such a young age. Ayesha had become the youngest student pilot in India at the age of 16 years in 2011.
Neha has roots in K.P Road area. She did her schooling from south Kashmir’s Anantnag district and then moved to Chandigarh for higher studies. She finished her 12th class in September 2018 and then joined Chimes Aviation Academy in Madhya Pradesh.
She said that the thought of flying an aeroplane fascinated her to become a pilot. She has been fascinated by pilots. Earlier, she didn’t know much about this profession and would always spend hours surfing the Internet to know details this career.
Neha vividly remembers flying the Cessna 172 aircraft. This was the first time in her life when she was flying an aircraft after getting a commercial license. She was absolutely thrilled with the experience. This whole journey of attaining her commercial pilot’s license (CPL) was surreal for her.
She finished 200 hours of flying training, out of which 185 hours were on Cessna 172 and 15 on DA42 aircraft. As a child, she often wondered if she could be able to fulfil her dreams in the future. She is proud of the fact that her dream has now become a reality. She wants to work with Indigo airlines in the future.
She says that her parents supported her financially and emotionally throughout this journey.
Her father, Fida Wani, is a businessman. He said that they kept supporting Neha even though many people were talking bad about them. He said that sometimes it was getting very difficult for us but we never backed down. Her parents are very proud of her.
Neha says that everyone has the potential to do something out of the box. She believes that all we need to do is to know our goals and work hard to achieve them.
