The British Shackle Finally Being Removed By IAF
The British in a well planned move ensured that our HF24 Fighter programme finally got shut down.
This excellent fighter finally could not be developed further and mass produced because Rolls Royce was unable to provide a suitably powered engine.
Then they sold us the JAGUARS. From late 1970s IAF received a total of around 160+ Jauars, out of which by now 50+ have crashed.
The IAF now has 116 Jaguars and the plan was to replace the current underpowered engines on 80 jets with more powerful Honeywell F-125IN engines, but the plan has been repeatedly delayed.
India, which is one of the last users of the Jaguar jets, has procured older Jaguar airframes from several countries in the past few years to cannibalise them for spares to maintain its fleet.
Airframes have been procured from France and Oman, which gave them free of cost. The U.K. is set to give some frames at a nominal cost. “India paid for the transportation,” an official source said.
The Indian Air Force (IAF) has called off the long-pending plan to give new engines to the Jaguar fighter fleet because of time and cost concerns. However, there is no immediate need for their replacement.
The design and development [of the engines] itself will take six years and then [more years for] modifying the aircraft. The project will take too long beside the high cost. So the proposal has been called off.
There is no need for their replacement as the phase-out plan will start in 2023 for the earliest variants and will be spread over 15 years till 2038 and even beyond.
Now, the IAF has decided that the cost of the programme has become prohibitive and it was taking too long.
The first Jaguar with DARIN-III upgrades is ready and has completed corporate flying last week. It is now ready for customer acceptance trials. The upgrade being done by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL) is a few years behind schedule.
The DARIN-III upgrades include a new radar, a fully integrated electronic warfare suite, smart multi-function displays, new avionics, and a new attack system. The HAL will upgrade 56 Jaguars to DARIN-III standard, and the project will be completed by 2024.
There are talks that Jaguars will get a new advanced short-range air-to-air missile (ASRAAM) of European missile-maker MBDA, which is in the process of being integrated.
The ASRAAM is widely used as a within visual range (WVR) air-dominance missile with a range of over 25 km. It will be the first wing-launched missile in the IAF inventory. All missiles are now fired from under the wing.
After 2925, IAF should be operating around four squadrons if Jaguars. They should be placed under Southern Air Command and the Andaman & Nicobar Command for providing support to the Indian Navy.
