Hi
@ziaulislam
I can understand your sentiments. It is perfectly right to vocalize your sentiments, however what is WRONG is not doing your homework properly. Had you actually cared to go through elaborate reports, you wouldnt have fallen for the bait. In the detailed report it is clearly mentioned that, under revised proposal HAL actually rectified the ferry range problem in tune with the IAF's requirement. What they however failed to do was the delivery time lines and price. The non compliance as of now is NOT due to ferry range but more due to timelines and price. LCA no doubt have been at the receiving end of fantastic program management of our PSUs (pun intended!), however let me assure most of its technical problems were gradually and steadfastly overcome in last 15 years! The 83 MK1A are pretty much in line with IAF's requirements. Now that MK1 facility has picked up pace, MK1A and MK2 are the fighter jets that will form the bulk of light/medium category in years to come.
PS: Also next time when you post something, do not merely resort to one or two news article, instead go through a whole host of them to formulate entire picture.
Here is the detailed report-
https://swarajyamag.com/insta/after...force-to-approach-defence-acquisition-council
and it clearly states:
Following Hindustan Aeronautics Limited’s (HAL’s) repeated non-compliance in terms of fulfilling requirements in the Tejas aircraft deal, the Indian Air Force (IAF) has decided to take up the matter with the Defence Ministry,
reports ANI.
In December 2017, the IAF had issued a single vendor tender to HAL, and the latter sent back its first commercial and technical response to it in March 2018.
As per the report, there were three major shortcomings in HAL’s response.
The HAL's offer on price and other aspects was valid only for 12 months, however, the procurement procedure required it to be minimum 18 months. The delivery time offered by the HAL was thus not deemed acceptable.
As per IAF officials quoted in the report, it was also found that the aircraft range and the endurance levels were not in compliance with the requirements. Endurance level pertains to the amount of time an aircraft can be in the air.
The IAF officials thus told HAL to rectify the issues in the proposal and send a revised response. But non-compliance was also noted in HAL’s subsequent responses which were received in the last 15 days.
“The delivery schedule now proposed by HAL remains a non-compliance, for which the IAF is approaching Defence Acquisition Council,” IAF said.
Under the new responses, HAL complied with the ferry range but failed to solve the delivery schedule matter following which IAF has now reportedly decided to approach the Defence Acquisition Council.
The program is already said to have been delayed by over a year despite getting the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) nod in 2016.
The Air Force had already placed an order for 40 LCA jets and had issued tenders to the HAL for another 83 Mark 1A LCAs to replace its old fleet of MiG-27 and MiG 21 aircraft but has had to postpone their retirement given the delays in the LCA and other fighter aircraft procurement projects.
Hi!
It is inconsequential what you believe in! I have had the opportunity to interact with folks who were once the test pilots of the program and my batch mates worked on the certain aspects of the jet. There was indeed a time when it was more of technology demonstrator program and less of an actual war fighting machine. However what a lot of people fail to realize (including a lot of Indians: Please note that since India has acquired some decent buying power in last 2 decades, it is a mecca for international companies and a lot of stories are purposefully planted in media to show various indigenous programs in dim light to prepare the way for imports.) is that over past 15 years, the plane has gone through some major iterations and changes in flight control logic to expand the envelop (hint: improvement in sustained turn rates) that, those issues are not a problem anymore. In fact to your surprise, India does have some decent expertise in developing flight control laws and composites. And no flight control laws are not mere codes, they are the physics of the aircraft and how can they be effectively controlled using digital computer. It uses MRAC like most other modern digtial FBW aircrafts (something which JF-17 still lacks! I am not at all claiming that JF-17 is inferior, it is just that JF-17's controls are not as sophisticated as LCA's).
