Inaugurated by Prime Minster Narendra Modi earlier today, the 14th edition of Aero India is being held under the theme “The runway to a billion opportunities”.
A day prior to the inauguration of biennial show, Prime Minister Modi shared aerial coverage of ground and aerial footage captured from an indigenously developed TAPAS Medium Altitude Long Endurance Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (MALE UAV), from a height of 12,000 feet.
The inaugural day flypast featured a series of aircraft both foreign and domestic. HAL’s flypast featured a formation flight of 15 helicopters consisting of all variants of Dhruv, ‘Prachand’ Light Combat Helicopter, and Light Utility Helicopter (LUH), in addition to LCA twin seater variants, Hawk-i, Intermediate Jet Trainer (IJT) and Hindustan Turbo Trainer (HTT)-40 aircraft.
Other aircraft that participated in the flypast, included aircraft from the Indian Air Force (IAF) – Sukhoi SU-30 MKI, Rafale, Jaguar, MiG-29, Mirage 2000 and Netra AEW&C, as also the Suryakiran and Sarang aerobatic display teams.
More than INR 75,000 crore worth of MoUs are expected to be concluded by the end of the airshow and much of it will be directed towards Indian industry. There are over 800 companies participating at Aero India this year.
While Aero India is primarily focussed on the aerospace sector, many of the exhibitors this year, including BrahMos Aerospace, Larsen & Toubro, Tata Advanced Systems, Bharat Forge, Hindustan Aeronautics (HAL), Bharat Electronics (BEL), Bharat Dynamics (BDL) and BEML also handle defence projects in the air, land and sea realm.
Home-Grown Bounty
As per information released by the Ministry of Defence (MoD), the developmental costs of the Tejas Mk1 programme (air force and navy) amounted to INR 14,000 crore. The orders for the first 40 Tejas Mk-1 aircraft were worth INR 11,300 crore and the order for 83 Tejas Mk-1A aircraft placed in 2021 was worth INR 48,000 crore.
The upcoming Tejas Mk2 programme is expected to have a developmental cost of INR 9,000 crore, while the developmental cost of AMCA/ TEDBF programmes are expected to exceed INR 15,000 crore.
Overall investments of around INR 97,000 crore in these programmes are expected to provide a major boost to the Indian industry.
The growing defence expenditure towards Research & Development (R&D) is also a welcome move and budget allocation to the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO) has been increased to INR 23,624 crore in the latest budget.
Funding has also been increased for Innovations in Defence Excellence (iDEX) and Defence Testing Infrastructure Scheme (DTIS) by 93% and 95% to INR 116 crore and INR 45 crore, respectively. As per the MoD, the DRDO is currently working on 55 Mission Mode projects for a total sanctioned cost of INR 73,942 crore.
New Offerings
Hindustan Aeronautics (HAL) has unveiled a new aircraft concept at the ongoing airshow, the Hindustan Lead in Fighter Trainer (HLFT-42). A model of the ‘Next Gen Supersonic Trainer’ is on display and company officials say that the new aircraft can play critical role in modern combat aircraft training, should the air force decide to go ahead with the programme.
The HLFT-42 will feature an Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA), Electronic Warfare (EW) suite, Infrared Search and Track (IRST) with Fly by Wire control (FBW) system. The HTT-40 (Hindustan Turbo Trainer-40) basic trainer aircraft is already in production at HAL with confirmed orders for 70 aircraft, worth INR 6,800 crore.
An actual Tejas fighter in Final Operational Clearance (FOC) configuration is also being displayed at the India Pavilion.
HAL is now producing 83 Tejas Mk-1A fighter jets for the Indian Air Force worth over INR 46,000 crore. HAL is to deliver the first three aircraft next year and the last aircraft by 2029.
HAL, for the first time, is also displaying the civil certified Hindustan-228 at the static display. The aircraft is being offered to Indian regional airlines. Also on display is the army variant of the Light Utility Helicopter (LUH) and Light Combat Helicopter (LCH). A Dhruv utility helicopter Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU) variant is also being displayed.
Pioneering Deal
The defence private sector has been buoyed by the start of the Airbus Defence C-295MW medium transport manufacture programme by Tata Advanced Systems (TASL). The contract worth nearly INR 22,000 crore will see 56 Airbus Defence C-295MW medium transports being acquired by the IAF, with 40 of these being built in India. The first C-295MW produced in India will be ready in September 2026.
This programme will further grow the ecosystem for aircraft manufacturing in India as the Tata consortium and local Indian industry will manufacture over 13,400 detailed parts and 4,600 sub-assemblies. All seven major component assemblies will be taken up in India, along with tools, jigs and testers.
More than 125 in-country MSME suppliers spread over seven states have already been identified, and the entire programme is expected to directly result in 600 highly skilled jobs, deliver more than 3,000 indirect jobs and an additional 3,000 medium skill employment opportunities with more than 42.5 lakh man hours of work to be undertaken within the aerospace and defence sector of India. Airbus will also train nearly 240 engineers at its facility in Spain.
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