Another BS article of IDRW...
- IN has no importance on 5th gen fighters, if they had, they would not waste time and money on N-LCA
- IN is highly interested in Rafale M since the early 2000s, but so far came to the conclusion, that it would need carriers with catapults to use it efficiently, which they don't have
- there is no decision from the US side, if we get catapults for IAC 2 yet
And to answer your question, the question is not naval Pak Fa / FGFA or F35, but ski-jump or captapult take off, because the naval Pak Fa / FGFA won't be able to be used from catapults. So if the US keep denying us catapults, we will build bigger IAC1s, which then could carry Mig 29Ks, N-LCAs or naval Pak Fa / FGFA and rejects the need of any other foreign fighter. IN btw sent the RFI to LM only because they are developing naval fighters, not because they are particularly interested in the F35 and they only asked for the C version, while LM decided to brief IN about the B version too, but IN is quiet clear that they don't want more STOVL fighters anymore, since they have carriers with arrested landing systems.