New Delhi: In a shot in the arm for the country’s self-reliance campaign, the Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the purchase of 70 locally made basic trainer aircraft for the Indian Air Force (IAF), and three cadet training ships for the India Navy at a cost of ₹6,838 crore and ₹3,100 crore respectively, the defence ministry said in a statement.
The contract for the basic trainers will be signed with state-run plane maker Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) while private sector major Larsen & Toubro will get the order for the training ships.
The new aircraft, a longstanding need, will provide a boost to the ab initio training of air force pilots. Basic trainers figure on the long list of weapons and systems that India has imposed an import ban on during the last 30 months. HAL will supply the Hindustan Turbo Trainer-40 (HTT-40) planes to IAF over a period of six years.
“The HTT-40 contains around 56% indigenous content, which will progressively increase to over 60% through further indigenisation of major components and subsystems. HAL will engage the Indian private industry, including micro, small and medium enterprises, in its supply chain,” the defence ministry said. The order is likely to generate 1,500 direct, and 3,000 indirect jobs across 100 MSMEs, according to the ministry’s estimates.
Currently, ab initio, or early, training of all rookie pilots is carried out on Swiss-origin Pilatus PC-7 MkII planes and Kiran Mk-1/1A trainers. Those training to become fighter pilots further train on the British-origin Hawk advanced jet trainers.
In July 2019, the defence ministry suspended business dealings with Swiss plane maker Pilatus Aircraft Limited for one year for violation of a pre-contract integrity pact in a ₹2,900-crore contract for 75 basic trainers, and also factoring in Indian investigations against the plane maker for alleged corruption and irregularities. The contract with Pilatus included a clause for follow-on purchase of 38 more planes.
“The air force had announced its plans to induct 70 HTT-40 trainers two year back to meet a longstanding need. The platform has gone through rigorous testing to be declared fit for ab initio training,” said Air Marshal Anil Chopra (retd), director general, Centre for Air Power Studies.
At Aero India 2023, held at the Yelahanka airbase in Bengaluru in February, IAF chief Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari led the “gurukul” formation in the light combat aircraft Tejas. The HTT-40, the intermediate jet trainer and the Hawk-i aircraft were part of the four-aircraft formation.
The HTT-40 is a turboprop aircraft and designed to have good low speed handling qualities and provide better training effectiveness, officials said.
“This fully aerobatic tandem seat turbo trainer has air conditioned cockpit, modern avionics, hot refueling (refuelling with the engine running on the ground), and zero-zero ejection seats (providing for safe ejection at low speeds and low heights). The aircraft will meet the shortage of basic trainer aircraft,” the ministry said in its statement.
The delivery of the indigenously designed, developed and manufactured training ships is expected to begin in 2026, the ministry said. These ships will cater to the training of officer cadets, including women, at sea after their basic training to meet the future requirements of the navy, it added.
The ships will be constructed at L&T’s Kattupalli facility in Tamil Nadu. The project will generate an employment of 2.25 million man-days over a period of four-and-half years, and encourage the participation of Indian shipbuilding and associated industries, including MSMEs, the officials said. “With the majority of the equipment and systems sourced from indigenous manufacturers, these vessels will be a proud flag bearer of ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat’ in consonance with the ‘Make in India’ initiative,” the statement added.
At Aero India, defence minister Rajnath Singh announced that India has earmarked 75% of this year’s defence capital procurement budget for buying weapons and systems from local manufacturers, with the move aimed at unlocking new opportunities for achieving self-reliance targets and ramping up the country’s defence exports.
The share of the domestic sector in the defence budget was never higher. India set aside 68% of the military’s capital acquisition budget for making indigenous purchases in 2022-23, 64% in 2021-22, and 58% in 2020-21.
Around ₹1 lakh crore has been set aside for domestic procurement this year, compared to ₹84,598 crore, ₹70,221 crore and ₹51,000 crore in the three previous years.
Apart from creating a separate budget for buying locally made military hardware, the government has taken a raft of steps to promote self-reliance in the defence manufacturing sector including increasing foreign direct investment (FDI) from 49% to 74%, and notifying hundreds of weapons and systems that cannot be imported.
Singh indicated in February that India could bring more weapons and systems under an import ban, and manufacture them in the country to give a new push to self-reliance. So far, four “positive indigenisation lists” have barred the import of 411 military items.