HAL hands over 1st Tejas twin seater aircraft to Air Force

Bengaluru: The Bengaluru-headquartered Hindustan Aeronautics Limited on Wednesday handed over the first LCA Tejas twin seater aircraft to the Indian Air Force.

HAL said the twin seater variant is quipped to support the training requirements of the IAF and can fulfil the role of a fighter in case of necessity.

Union Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt was the chief guest during the function wherein the unveiling of the LCA twin seater, handing over of Release to Service (RSD), Signalling out Certificate (SOC) were conducted in the presence of Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari, among others.

The LCA Tejas twin seater is a light weight, all weather multi-role 4.5 generation aircraft.

It is an amalgamation of contemporary concepts and technologies, such as relaxed static-stability, quadraplex fly-by-wire flight control, carefree maneuvering, advanced glass cockpit, integrated digital avionics systems and advanced composite materials for the airframe, HAL said.

This adds India to the list of "very few" elite countries who have created such capabilities and have them operational in their Defence Forces, it said, adding, it's another feather on the cap of "Atmanirbhar Bharat" initiative of the Government of India.

"This historic event today will mark the achievement of a key milestone of producing an LCA twin seater which is designed with a strategic intent of graduating the budding pilots from the twin seater variants to fighter pilots", HAL said.

HAL has an order of 18 twin seaters from IAF and is planning to deliver eight of them during 2023-24. The remaining 10 would be delivered progressively by 2026-27.

Further, more orders are also expected from IAF, the company said.