Ministarstv odbrane Indije saopštilo je da će prvi od tri naručena avaksa, koji su trebali biti isporučeni u novembru 2007. godine, sleteti na indijski aerodrom u januaru ili februaru 2009. godine.
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Defence ministry sources said the first of the three Awacs, initially slated to be delivered in November 2007 under the $1.1-billion deal signed in March 2004, will now land in India by January-February 2009.
In the huge project, three Phalcon early-warning radars are being mounted on Russian heavy-lift IL-76 military aircraft under a tripartite agreement among India, Israel and Russia. "There have been technical hitches in the integration work. But we are pushing the Israeli Aerospace Industries (IAI) to deliver the first Awacs before the end of this year," said a source.
Technical glitches are not the only problem with the project. As reported by TOI earlier, there are allegations of kickbacks swirling around the deal, with reports holding India has been steeply overcharged for the Awacs. The government, however, has not given much credence to such reports, even though CBI is already investigating kickbacks in the original Rs 1,160-crore Israeli Barak-I anti-missile defence system contract, in which former defence minister George Fernandes, arms dealer Suresh Nanda and others have been named as the accused. This, of course, does not detract from the fact that IAF desperately needs the Phalcon Awacs, much like the Barak system was a crucial requirement for Navy.
Awacs, or "eyes in the sky", will help IAF detect incoming hostile cruise missiles and aircraft much before ground-based radars, apart from directing air defence fighters during combat operations with enemy jets. For instance, an Awacs flying over Amritsar will be able to detect a Pakistani F-16 fighter as soon as it takes off from its Sargodha airbase. India, incidentally, signed a $210-million deal with Brazilian firm Embraer for three aircraft in July for its own indigenous miniature Awacs project.
The indigenous AEW&C systems being developed by DRDO will be mounted on the three Embraer-145 jets, with the delivery of the first one slated for 2011-2012. The project is worth around Rs 1,800 crore. India, incidentally, is also on course to acquire four more Israeli Aerostat radars, at a cost of around $300 million, to bolster its ability to detect hostile low-flying aircraft, helicopters, spy drones and missiles.
The IAF's case for the new Aerostat radars as a "follow-on" order to the two such EL/M-2083 radars, inducted from Israel in 2004-2005 for $145 million, has finally been cleared by the Defence Acquisitions Council, headed by defence minister A K Antony, now.
After being in a limbo for some time due to the Barak kickbacks case, the defence ministry has decided to go full steam ahead with procurements and projects with Israel, which has notched up arms sales worth around $8 billion to India since the 1999 Kargil conflict. The ministry will, however, take a final clearance from the Cabinet Committee on Security and the "competent financial authority" before the new procurement deals are actually inked.
