No Plan B on MMRCA: IAF Chief

The Chief of Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal, Arup Raha has said that even while the contracting committee, one of the four sub-committees going through the 126 multi medium role combat aircraft (MMRCA) deal, is looking at issues of the selected L1 vendor Dassault Aviation (Rafale), there is ‘No Plan B’.

Addressing media persons at Aero India 2015, the Air Chief repeated what the Minister of Defence, Manohar Parikkar had said that the government would await the report of the contract negotiating committee to submit its report before taking any decision. “It is important that we get the MMRCA at the earliest.”

Stating that obsolescence has hit the Indian Air Force, the Air Chief said there has been a considerable drawdown of the combat force. While, we have had midlife upgrades on aircraft and improved operational availability of aircraft, there is need to replace legacy aircraft and this had been indicated in the long term perspective plan. “We need to build up to 42 fighter squadrons for which we have to have the MMRCA, the FGFA (fifth generation fighter aircraft) and the AMCA (advanced medium combat aircraft) in the next four to five years.”

The IAF is phasing out MiG21 which has outlived its life and some of the fleet of MiG27. The induction plan in the IAF has been four squadrons of light combat aircraft (LCA Tejas), starting with two squadrons first, depending upon the production rate of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited. “The LCA has lagged behind, but we now have reached somepoint.” The final operational clearance is expected end December 2015.

The series production 1, 2 and 3 of LCA Tejas, he said, were different from one another in terms of design and features. It would be on SP3 that the design and features would be frozen. There is need for 20 aircraft for the first squadron, but a beginning could be made with four aircraft.

As regards inducting additional Su-30MKI aircraft, he said that they were two different aircraft and that one could not replace the other. To a question on upgrades to Jaguar, the Air Chief clarified that IAF is working with BAE Systems for product support and that upgrades would be in the form of autopilot, new engines, avionics etc. It still has operational life.

Asked about induction of unmanned combat aerial vehicles, the Air Chief mentioned that it was working with Defence Research Development Organisation (DRDO) on this and expected results soon.