NEW DELHI: The Indian Air Force (IAF) on Wednesday said that the first light combat aircraft Tejas Mk 1A is likely to be received by November this year, after missing the February 2024 deadline.
Tejas Mk1A is the newer and improved version of India’s single-engine, 4.5 generation delta wing multirole combat aircraft designed by the Aeronautical Development Agency.
A source in the defence and security establishment said that the plane’s maker, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), has promised that it would deliver the first aircraft by November.
“HAL had promised that it would deliver 16 aircraft this fiscal. But we do not believe that we would be able to receive even eight jets this fiscal,” the source added.
The IAF is currently grappling with depleting squadrons of fighter jets. “We are pushing for eight planes this fiscal year,” the source said.
It should be noted that the HAL has been facing issue with the supply of engines from the multinational conglomerate General Electric (GE) Company. The GE has not so far delivered a single F404-IN20 engine that powers the jets.
According to the defence source, there are several issues other than the engines, which HAL has to address. It also includes design and development.
“The engine is the larger issue, and behind it, all other problems are hidden,” he said. According to several media reports, GE had cited supply chain as the issue for the delay in delivering the engines to HAL.
The design and development issue would take time to be done, another source said. They also added that the HAL had to deliver 10 LCA Tejas trainer jets but only five have been delivered to the IAF.
For IAF, this is a matter of concern as the two squadrons of Russian-origin MiG-21 Bisons will be retired soon.
Defence order book
83 LCA Tejas Mk 1A ordered at Rs 46,000 cr in 2021, delivery was to start in March
97 LCA Tejas Mk 1A for Rs 67,000 cr was cleared by DAC in Nov 2023
40 LCA Tejas Mk 1 were ordered initially, of which 35 have been inducted till now
Tejas is a single engine, light weight multi role fighter, originally meant to replace MiG 21