For decades, India The nation's most sophisticated combat aircraft have typically showcased their foreign origins. However, the country’s drive toward independent military capabilities made significant progress last week when approval was finally granted for its indigenous stealth fighter jet project.
The Indian government’s approval of the Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) has been praised by experts as a pivotal moment for national defense, amid growing military tensions facing the nation from multiple fronts. Pakistan and China .
On Tuesday, New Delhi’s Defence Ministry declared that they had endorsed the "implementation plan" for the AMCA—a fifth-generation fighter aircraft initiative designed to boost the Indian Air Force's capacity for long-range strikes—thus clearing the path for prototype creation and subsequent manufacturing.
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This represents a crucial move toward leveraging local knowledge, skills, and resources to create the AMCA prototype, marking a significant achievement in this direction." Aatmanirbharta "A self-sufficient India" in the aerospace industry," stated the defense ministry in an official release, referencing the administration's key program aimed at enhancing local production and decreasing dependence on foreign acquisitions.
Antoine Levesque, a senior fellow focusing on defense, strategy, and diplomacy in South and Central Asia at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, stated that the AMCA project is currently advancing into a crucial, action-driven stage of development.
Approving an execution model for the fighter presents "a golden chance for India to establish a fresh defense industrial blueprint where both its well-established public sector and emerging private industries can collaborate on a much more equitable and efficient basis compared to any of India’s past major, long-term defense initiatives,” Levesques stated to This Week in Asia.
So far, reducing the longstanding gap between India’s public and private sectors stands as both a symbolic and genuine achievement of the AMCA program, indicating that 2025 could indeed be recognized as India's declared 'reform year.'
With indigenous systems such as the Very Short-Range Air Defence System (VSHORADS), portable anti-tank guided missiles (PATGMs), and the HAL Tejas Mark 2 lightweight fighter jet nearing deployment, India’s defense sector is poised at the brink of a revolutionary shift.
This change has likewise been expedited by the harsh realities of warfare. Operation Sindoor - India's latest military reaction to a violent assault targeting non-combatants In Indian-controlled Kashmir, Indian troops utilized indigenous air-defense systems—the Akash and Akashteer—to counter Pakistani drones and missiles.
According to retired Air Vice-Marshal Kapil Kak, the operation highlighted India's requirement to tackle both Pakistan and China's indirect role, underscoring the importance of indigenous defense systems for effective preparedness.
Kak stated to This Week in Asia, "As we planned for the future following Operation Sindoor, indigenous capabilities have become central to our thinking."
In the latest tensions between India and Pakistan, China had previously provided Islamabad with military technology, which was utilized in these confrontations, including items like PL-15 missiles and J-10C jets .
Kak mentioned that India did not originally plan to develop a fifth-generation fighter jet such as the AMCA; instead, the country was concentrating on the Tejas Mark 1A—a 4.5 generation multirole combat aircraft—and the even more advanced Mark 2 version.
He stated that the Mark 2 was subsequently meant to be succeeded by the AMCA, which would primarily be of the 4.5-generation standard and not intended as a fifth-generation aircraft.
However, experiences and insights gained from the United States - and the examination of Chinese systems - revealed to India that the development, testing, and production timeline for a fifth-generation fighter might actually be quicker than that for a fourth-generation aircraft, according to Kak.
He stated, “Programs from China are widely recognized.” There have been speculations that China could supply Pakistan with the J-35 fighter jet, placing India at a disadvantage should another conflict similar to Operation Sindoor occur.
Upon the introduction of the AMCA, India will become part of an exclusive club of countries possessing fifth-generation stealth aircraft, including the United States’ F-22 Raptor and F-35. China's J-20 , and Russia's Sukhoi Su-57.
Last March, the Indian Prime Minister led the Cabinet Committee on Security in a meeting. Narendra Modi Approved the complete design and development of five AMCA prototypes with an initial funding surpassing 150 billion rupees (approximately US$1.8 billion).
The AMCA is envisioned as a twin-engined, medium-weight multirole fighter with advanced stealth features, including internal weapons bays and sustained supersonic flight.
India faces the task of swiftly attaining consistent serialized manufacturing of an integrated system encompassing additional components, data handling, and sophisticated software—a degree of intricacy that India’s defense sector has not yet attained in one item, as per Levesques' observations.
The race for dependable foreign-made engines is intensifying and will expedite the program," he stated. "However, maintaining consistent political backing, along with the capability of industries to deliver on schedule and meet specifications, will be crucial elements during the execution stage once final action plans are established.
India presently utilizes French-made Rafales along with Soviet-era MiG-29s, among various other planes such as the aging MiG-21, Jaguars, and Mirage 2000s, together with the locally-developed HAL Tejas.
"India has made considerable progress in developing fighter jet systems, particularly through the successful Tejas program," stated Ajey Lele, who serves as the deputy director general at the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses in Delhi.
Logically, after the fourth and 4.5th generations, you would progress to the fifth generation.
Delhi expressed a strong desire to decrease reliance on foreign nations, especially concerning fighter planes, according to Lele. He added, "This shift is due to technological advancements that are currently underway in India."
Indian defense officials have previously stated their expectation for the AMCA to arrive within the coming ten years; however, Lele warned that predicting an exact timeframe at this stage would be premature.
"He mentioned that it relies on how swiftly the project comes together and the systems are established," adding that after a technology advances, progress can accelerate significantly, similar to what has been observed with BrahMos missile development .
Levesque stated that both India’s Defense Ministry and armed forces aim to maintain the progress of the AMCA project to offset the retirement of older planes and increase the total count of operational aircraft.
Maintaining the technological edge of new planes is a widespread worry among military groups, he stated, noting that this issue is particularly crucial for India considering that China might already be developing aircraft that surpass the AMCA by an entire generation.
Levesque stated that with the AMCA, it would be difficult to overstate the impact on India’s domestic technological capabilities and broader defense manufacturing expertise.
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The article initially appeared on the South China Morning Post (www.scmp.com), which serves as the premier source of news covering China and Asia.
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