Six Rafale trainer aircraft will carry RB series tail numbers which stand for Air Chief Marshal R K S Bhadauria, the current Chief of Air Staff who played a key role as lead negotiator for the mega deal.
As protests against the Agnipath military recruitment scheme intensified, the Army, Navy and the Air Force on Friday announced that they will start the enrolment process under the new model by next week while Defence Minister Rajnath Singh appealed to the youths wanting to join the armed forces to start preparing for the induction.
The CDS has the option to focus on key areas of capability development to fight new generation wars or get bogged down in trying to bring cosmetic changes to humour the political leadership, asserts Brigadier Narender Kumar (retd).
Armed forces veterans have expressed mixed reaction to the Agnipath scheme under which soldiers will be recruited in the Army, the Navy and the Air Force, largely on a short-term contractual basis, with an aim to cut the ballooning salary and pensions bill.
'Due to change in the weather, the challenges are increasing.' 'The morale of the air fighters is high and the availability of advanced equipment empowers them to face any enemy.'
The IAF chief also said Pakistan has become a pawn of Chinese policy and its dependence on China would increase further in future. He said India needs to understand the interplay of some major events in its vicinity that would impact the security scenario of the region.
The move is seen as a gamechanger in guarding the strategically important Indian Ocean Region.
The defence ministry in an official statement has informed that the minister will give a statement in Rajya Sabha at 11.30 am and in Lok Sabha at 12.15 pm.
'Let us remember that Make in India for defence must not be our goal.' 'The goal is to have a strong military to help the nation protect its identity and assert its will.'
Air Commodore Nitin Sathe discovers how the IAF trained Pakistani air force pilots, during the 1971 War, which led to the birth of the Bangladesh air force.
The Indians were among 128 asylum seekers, travelling in three boats, intercepted last week and sent for offshore processing, the Australian Associated Press reported on Monday.
The video showed the story of airstrikes which IAF carried out on Jaish-e-Mohammed camp in Balakot, Pakistan on February 26, earlier this year.
The Chinese aircraft have been regularly flying close to the LAC in the last three to four weeks which is seen as an attempt to probe the Indian defence mechanism in the area.
All equipment from the Army which were part of the Republic Day celebrations are made-in-India, Chief of Staff Delhi Area Maj Gen Bhavnish Kumar had earlier said.
MiG-21s are one of the oldest aircraft in the Indian Air Force fleet. Most of them are on the verge of being phased out from the inventory of the air force.
The search for the missing Malaysian airliner under India's 'Operation Searchlight' has been expended to the Bay of Bengal area 900km west of Port Blair by the navy, the defence ministry said on Friday.
'One of the things that gives a downed pilot strength is the knowledge and confidence that his government will do everything in its power and more to get him back.'
Seeking custody of the rape accused India Air Force flight lieutenant, the city police has filed a revision petition in the principal district court in Coimbatore.
Along with Tyagi, his cousin Sanjiv alias Julie Tyagi and lawyer Gautam Khaitan were also arrested.
The IAF has deployed almost all its frontline fighter jets like Sukhoi 30 MKI, Jaguar and Mirage 2000 aircraft in the key frontier air bases in eastern Ladakh and elsewhere along the Line of Actual Control.
The grandeur and might of the various types of aircraft in the Indian Air Force were on full display on the occasion of the 88th Air Force Day celebrations on Thursday.
The list of aircraft planned to be inducted by the Air Force include 36 Rafales, 114 Multirole Fighter Aircraft, 100 Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) and over 200 variants of the Light Combat Aircraft. "In the next 15 years, 83 LCAs are our primary focus, after that LCA Mark 2 will come in we are looking at close to 100 of those, that makes it near 200 of LCA class," Air Chief Marshal Bhadauria told ANI in an interview.
'The sky is the limit for what all could be done at an air base to neutralise terrorists. Good proactive local leadership and delegated operational effort would be key to ensuring that a handful of terrorists cannot hold a whole air base, and by extension, the whole nation to ransom,' says Group Captain P I Muralidharan (retd).
After the bowlers restricted Australia, a patient knock from KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja saw India clinch a five-wicket win over the visitors.
'Unless India ups the ante, Beijing will continue to believe its transgressions are cost free and will feel encouraged to do more of the same.'
An IAF "request for information" floated on the MoD website invites Indian companies to submit preliminary bids to supply the IAF with 106 PC-7 Mk II trainers. Ajai Shukla reports
Delivery of a great operational machine must not get affected to settle political scores, says Air Marshal Anil Chopra (retd).
'In the present era of strategic uncertainty and rapidly changing threats, no military professional now disputes the unavoidable necessity of a joint planning staff for the planning and conduct of joint operations so that integrated operations can be planned 'top down',' says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The only thing that might justify a response is the desperate state of Pakistan's economy and how its people are suffering. But it's better to be heartless for now, argues Shekhar Gupta.
December 16, 1971. A Day Never To Be Forgotten.
'While all would agree on the need to be ready to launch cross-border strikes on terror camps, there is sharp disagreement on how best to do it.' 'Through IAF fighters, or surface-to-surface missiles?' 'Or should army Special Forces be created to do the job?' 'If air strikes are the agreed priority, additional funding must be made available for the purchase of fighters and missiles.' 'If it is to be Special Forces, the army must be facilitated in raising a Special Forces Command,' notes Ajai Shukla.
Football legend Pele wound up his six-day visit to the country as a big crowd turned up at the Capital's Ambedkar Stadium to have a glimpse of the Brazilian three-time World Cup winner who battled physical difficulties to give the fans an experience of a lifetime.
Rajnath appreciated the proactive response by the IAF in bolstering its operational capabilities over the past few months.
Ezekiel Kemboi won the steeplechase gold in 2004 at Athens and in 2012 at the London Games. His brother Isaac is hoping to replicate the success at the Rio Olympics in two years' time even if it means beating the champion sibling.
Batting legend Sachin Tendulkar conducted a special screening of the much-awaited film on his life, 'Sachin: A Billion Dreams' for the Indian Armed Forces personnel at the Indian Air Force Auditorium, in New Delhi, on Saturday.
Prime Minister Imran Khan addressed a ceremony held at Pakistan Air Force base Minhas Kamra in Attock district of Punjab province to induct the new fighter jets.
In October 2018, India had signed a US$ 5 billion deal with Russia to buy five units of the S-400 air defence missile systems, despite a warning from the Trump administration that going ahead with the contract may invite US sanctions.
The weather and other conditions are at the moment looking good and it is expected to reach the Ambala air base on time.
Glimpses of General Bipin Rawat in the weeks leading to his tragic death on Wednesday.
The retreating Pakistani troops were heading towards Dacca and they had to be stopped at all costs. The Eastern Army Commander, in his orders to General Sagat Singh, had reiterated that he did not want the troops of 4 Corps to cross the Meghna river. But General Sagat had other plans to threaten Dacca and ensure that the pressure would make the Pakistani commanders capitulate. This is where the IAF helicopters came in.
