Sky power & lot of smoke

SUJAN DUTTA

A Tejas aircraft at Aero India 2009 at Yelahanka. (PTI) Bangalore, Feb 13 : A flaming orange lights its tail, a spiral of smoke charts its barrel-roll and India’s very own Tejas is today looking like a combat aircraft in the skies over Yelahanka, Bangalore. The Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) has a long history and a past that is torturing the Indian Air Force’s present and future. But at least now, for the first time in public view, it is looking like the fighter aircraft it was meant to be... a quarter century back. The sight of the Tejas (radiance) performing in a field with the F-16, the Superhornet and the Eurofighter that streak through the skies over here every hour is fuel for patriotic fervour. Defence minister A.K. Anthony says it fills him — as it should every Indian — with pride. The IAF is less than sure. One reason why the F-16 and the Eurofighter are flying here is to compete for an order to become part of the IAF’s inventory. And the IAF is issuing the order because the LCA Tejas is way behind schedule.  Had the LCA Tejas met its schedules, the IAF would not have had to go in for a global tender for 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft — that may be scaled up to more than 200 in a follow-up order.  “We are producing 40 LCAs of the mark I variety for initial operational clearance and then we will go on to the mark II variety after deciding on the engine. We cannot give timeframes now,” Hindustan Aeronautics chairman Ashok Baweja said.  That leaves the IAF still guessing about timelines.