IN WHAT may be called yet another attempt to step up the country’s defence prowess, IAF’s Air Chief Norman Anil Kumar Browne urged the defence scientists to ‘beg, borrow or steal’ technologies that can catapult India’s positioning in the world of defence.
Browne was speaking at a seminar organised by the Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) in New Delhi. At the seminar he tried to motivate the scientists to develop an indigenous fighter aircraft, something that has not taken place in the last thirty years. Earlier DRDO, who was assigned to build on the same project, was given a sanction of $500 million. The Kaveri engine programme that was supposed to fill in the responsibilities of an aeroengine for the Light Combat Aircraft (LAC) is yet to be fully developed and right now the American GE engines are fructifying the LCA’s needs. A few months back, the LCA was again tested on the Russian made Ilyushin-76 transport aircraft test range. While speaking at the seminar Browne was quoted as saying by IANS, “This (aeroengine) is an area where we need to focus. This is one of the core technologies required by the nation”.
Apart from the indigenous aeroengine that Browne emphasised to build, he also asked the defence scientists to focus on building the recent Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar. AESA for quite a while is being deployed in the air force around the world
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