Watch Tejas burn the skies

Come, watch India’s very own aircraft, the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas pierce the clouds majestically. Bengalureans must know that they will be witnessing not only breathtaking manouvres by the LCA, but the fulfillment of a long-cherished dream of India to have its very own combat aircraft fly high.

 Small and light, in its class, the LCA is touted to be the world’s best. But world’s best or not, people will get to see at the Aero India a marvel aircraft that has conducted over 2,800 test flights without a single crash. That in itself and the desire to see India’s own aircraft fly is nothing short of a thrill and wonder that every adult and child would want to experience. 

So how real is the LCA dream? The final operational Clearance (FOC) for Tejas and its induction into the Indian Air Force (IAF) is the moment India is waiting for as that would mean India and its aero scientists would have fulfilled their long-cherished dream of building and flying a combat aircraft on their own. The LCA is fast approaching that moment - 32 years after the project was launched around 1983-84. 

It is by 2015-end or early 2016 that IAF is planning to give the FOC to the aircraft
based on test flights of the aircraft by IAF pilots and their feedback. The pilots would have to confirm that the LCA is working as per all parameters set for it by the IAF to be inducted as a combat-ready aircraft and to raise exclusive LCA squadrons. Soon after clearance by IAF, the aircraft would be stationed at Sulur air base, Tamil Nadu. 

LCA squadrons

Each LCA squadron would have around 16 to 18 aircraft. There are plans to raise at least five squadrons of LCA. By the time this is done, the LCA’s more advanced Mark-II version would be inducted, around 2018-20. The first few squadrons, though, would be the Mark-I version that is currently under testing.

Presently, one aircraft has been inducted by IAF, which is waiting for the FOC so that it could produce more LCA’s going up to 200 aircrafts. All this will take time and pressure is high on HAL and DRDO to deliver the aircraft as quickly as possible, because the LCA is meant to replace the ageing  MiG-21.

The LCA project took off in the 1980s when India felt the need for an indigenous fighter keeping in view the geo-politics in South Asia. A decision was taken to launch an agency to spearhead the design and frame of the new aircraft. Subsequently, the Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) was set up for the designing work. A fund was approved for the project - at that time the fund was about Rs 560 crore. 

By the time the LCA project is over, the country would have spent nearly Rs 25,000 crore on the entire programme, which includes the LCA Mark-I and II and LCA Navy. The cost has gone up sharply owing to natural inflationary factors and rise in costs of labour and equipment and technology. From the 1980’s, when it was first conceived, the LCA would go on till 2020, which would be around 40 years. 

Experts in the aerospace sector say that no aircraft project in the world has been completed in under 10 years. The American Joint Strike Fighter, a fifth generation stealth aircraft being produced by Lockheed Martin is said to have taken close to two decades and fine-tuning is still on.

While it took time to design a prototype in the late 1980’s and early 1990s, a real crisis hit the LCA project in the late 1990s when the US denied India access to technology citing military clauses, dual technology use and the 1998 nuclear tests.

Access was denied to collaborate on flight control laws and fly-by-wire systems, very vital systems in the development of the LCA. This delayed the project majorly. The Fly-by-wire flight control system had become state of the art technology. 

In 1992, the LCA National Control Law (CLAW) team was set up by the National Aeronautics Laboratory to develop India's own version of the flight control system for the Tejas.

Lockheed Martin's involvement was terminated in 1998 as part of an embargo enacted by the US in response to India's second nuclear tests in May of that year. The NAL's CLAW team eventually managed to successfully complete integration of the flight control laws by themselves, with the FCS software performing flawlessly for over 50 hours of pilot testing, on Technology Demonstrator (TD-1), resulting in the aircraft being cleared for flight in early 2001. 

Maiden flight 

The LCA's maiden flight was made by TD-1 from National Flight Test Centre (NFTC), near Bengaluru, on January 4, 2001 and its first successful supersonic flight followed on  August 1, 2003. Pilots regarded the Tejas as the IAF's most "pilot friendly" fighter.

An NFTC test pilot, during the IOC ceremony on 20 December 2013 remarked: “As a multi-role fighter, Tejas is at least the equal of the IAF's upgraded Mirage-2000. It can more than hold its own in our operational scenario.”

By 2002, Indian scientists surpassed the challenge of building on their own control laws and fly-by-wire systems. They declared that flights controls now were well within India’s grasp and the project of developing the aircraft could go on.

Building the aircraft meant beating the US sanctions - which Indian scientists did successfully. The first test flight of a LCA prototype however took place on January 4, 2001 and till date it has completed 2871 test flights without a single crash in 15 years.