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IAF to get desi AJTs

The advanced jet trainers for the Indian Air Force will be made indigenously, the defence ministry has stated.

The ministry's annual report says that AJTs would be built in India from scratch. The decision has been taken after discussions with various vendors including the British Aerospace, Dassault Aviation Company and a Russian company.

The government had approved the acquisition of AJTs several years ago, to meet the IAF's stage III training requirements.

The report also says that additional MIG-21 trainers have been acquired to augment existing resources and cater to the training requirements pending the entry of AJTs into squadron services.

The need to urgently induct AJTs in the force had once again shot into prominence when the comptroller and auditor general, in its latest report tabled in Parliament, took the government to task for the delay in acquiring the aircraft. Besides taking a heavy toll by way of accidents, the non- availability of the aircraft was adversely affecting combat training of pilots, it said.

The CAG, a constitutional authority, noted that the lack of AJTs was to blame for a majority of human error accidents in the force. An analysis revealed that there were more accidents in stage III training conducted on MiG-21 aircraft than on Hunters.

The AJT proposal has been hanging fire since 1984.

UNI

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