Sorry if I offended your feelings, but you are wrong at least by the posts above which repeatedly claim a first flight in 2025! And this is - at least by my definition very "soon" and "too soon" given the long delays of a type, which is not very much of a most modern high-end fighter, namely the Tejas.
About the 2025 first flight- that is the likely date by when a NG-TD (Next Gen - Tech Demonstator) demonstrator will be flown; caveat- if the funding is made available for the demonstrator to be assembled by 2024-25.
ADA had released a tender many months ago to have the forward, mid and aft fuselage sections assembled at Sulur AFS, in Coimbatore. 2 NG-TDs were to be flown and they need to prove the basic 5th gen technologies.
After that, the production standard prototypes will be assembled and flown. Given the level of technology meant to go into the AMCA, it will not be anytime before 2035 that I would expect the AMCA to enter service. But that is my estimate and ADA hasn't put out any timelines since the project hasn't yet been granted funding to begin full scale development.
Point is that they are refining the Tejas design since decades and now they propose the Mk.2 - in fact a type, the IAF originally aimed for - will also only be ready at around the same time ... so at least by my assumption in mind of the past track-record I would bet nearly everything that neither the date for the Tejas Mk.2 (de facto a new aircraft) nor for the AMCA in 2025 will be met.
You've got it a bit wrong here, so let me explain.
the MWF (Tejas Mk2) is not the type the IAF originally aimed for in the 1980s. The IAF didn't want a Mirage-2000 and MiG-29 replacement from the LCA program, since both were brand new in the IAF back then. It wanted a MiG-21 class aircraft and set ambitious ASRs for it that far exceeded the MiG-21. A few of the original ASRs were not met and concessions were granted, but that is normal for each and every program. Unless of course, one is deliberately hiding facts about a program, which is very true of certain nations that don't have a free press or transparency. If only fanboys were to talk about the Tejas, you'd only hear good things about it. We only know about all the problems that the F-35 faced because they have the most vibrant and well informed media and a lot of transparency.
Even in the MRCA 1.0 contest, all the contestants failed to meet some of the ASRs that the IAF set. Does that mean they were all bad? No, some of those could be fixed to meet the ASRs and some couldn't. If required, any of the MRCA contestants could've entered IAF service with the IAF granting concessions. Par for the course. In all of the IAF's history, every single imported jet has failed to meet some or the other stated requirement. the IAF has adjusted accordingly or upgraded it to meet them. Case in point- the DARIN-1 upgrade for the Jaguar, which started the same year it entered service since the original NAVWASS equipment was considered unacceptable!
The Mk1A was proposed by HAL as a bridge between the Mk1 and the then Tejas Mk2 (which had a MTOW of 15.5 tons and F-414 engine). Once IAF bought into the Tejas Mk1A, and indicated that 83 would be ordered, for a total of 123 Tejas Mk1 and Mk1A fighters, that would replace the 126 MiG-21bis that were upgraded to Bison standard, the LCA program would shift over to the larger class Mk2.
Once the IAF was happy with the changes being brought on the Mk1A, the focus shifted to adding more fuel and payload to the Tejas Mk2 and making it a fighter that could replace the Mirage-2000 and MiG-29. That is the MWF and you are entitled to your view on when you think it would fly or enter service.
Again, you miss one important issue: Not the number of configurations tested nor the important changes are relevant - indeed Japan, Korea, Turkey (IMO a very different story) and others have shown sometimes even more such models - but the fact, that certain circles in India and such forums keep posting expectations, which are impossible to hold, they are sticking to timelines, when even those for the much simpler types (aka Tejas Mk. 1 and 1A) are no longer valid, and still wanted to be taken seriously!?
That's the point.
2025 for the first flight of a NG-TD demonstrator is doable provided the funding is provided to do that. I don't believe it has been done as yet. It will be like the J-31 first flight in 2012, which was clearly nowhere near being production ready. We saw major changes in the proposed FC-31 fighter model later displayed as an export product, which has not yet flown in that config, 8 years after that first flight. Why? Because the J-20 has taken up all the resources as of now.
NG-TD AMCA demo will fly with F-414-INS6 engines, with a very limited FBW Flight Control Law with limited gains initially and the program will slowly build up pace of testing and envelope expansion. Depending on how that goes, there will be limited series production prototypes built with the interim F-414-INS6. The experience gained with the Tejas FCS means it won't be such a long process, but it will be very involved nevertheless. The final variant of the AMCA with twin 115 kN thrust class engines is a long way off. The engine doesn't yet exist, so all we can say as of now is that the interim F-414-INS6 will power the first few squadrons of AMCA when they enter service, possibly around 2035.
Many posters are driven by the desire for the IAF to have a 5th gen fighter because China is fielding the J-20 now and the F-35 is entering service in large numbers. And some may underestimate the amount of work that needs to be done to get the AMCA to IOC level. One area where I still have my hopes pinned is the bringing in of private sector players in a big way into the Indian aerospace complex. They allow the freeing up of resources at HAL and other DRDO labs for R&D, while the private suppliers do what they do best- manufacture.
