Indian Air Force Day - 2026

 Indian Air Force Day:  The Marut (HF24) and the Unfinished Business of Self-Reliance.

Today, 8 October, the Indian Air Force celebrates its 94th anniversary. Four of my Sainik School classmates – Pramod Deshpande, Kalyani Biradar, Chand Nadaf and Tayannavar - wore the blue uniform: one of them as a pilot in the Air Force, another as a pilot in the Indian Navy, and the other two supporting their brethren in maintaining these flying machines for defence preparedness. There are many other alumni from our school who proudly have served the Indian Air Force, including two of our fellow Ajeets, Alumni of SSBJ, who have made their supreme sacrifice while serving the nation. So, this day is personal for all Ajeets, including yours truly. To my class buddies and to the entire Air Force fraternity, a very Happy Air Force Day.

Modern wars are decided in the skies long before the ground forces meet. That is why air power is among the most critical pillars of a nation's defence. It is also why India's fighter story deserves to be remembered with pride and examined with honesty.

Today, few remember that India was once ahead of most of Asia in building its own fighter plane. The HF-24 Marut, made by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), was among the first fighter jets designed and built outside Europe, the Soviet Union and the United States. HAL itself traces its roots to Walchand Hirachand and Bharat Ratna, Sir M. Visvesvaraya, who persuaded the Mysore government to set up an aircraft factory in Bangalore. It was in 1956 that Pandit Nehru asked HAL to build a Mach 2 fighter, and the German designer Kurt Tank of WWII fame was brought in to lead this project.

It was during the planning, designing, and manufacturing of the fighter plane at HAL that Kurt Tank and his team confronted their first challenge - The engine. The engine Tank had designed the aircraft around was never sourced, partially due to scarcity of funds and partly due to bureaucratic delay and indifference. And years of searching for an alternative engine to achieve the same desired result came to nothing.

The substitute engine sourced to manufacture the fighter produced far less thrust than the design needed. The Marut was meant to be a Mach 2 fighter when it was envisaged. However, it never got beyond barely touching Mach 1 at altitude, and by the time it entered into combat service in 1967, the IAF was already preparing itself to adopt the better fighter aircraft, MiG-21.

Yet the Marut – HF 24 carries a special place in the Indian Air Force History. Besides, the Nehru Science Centre is in proud possession of one of these fighter aircraft displayed in the open-air science park.

In the Battle of Longewala in 1971 – part of the Liberation of Bangladesh War that India was forced into fighting in 1971 against Pakistan - the Maruts of No. 10 Squadron, alongside the Hunters, helped break a massive Pakistani armoured tank movement and destroyed their effort to overrun a tiny Indian garrison. The Air Warriors of the Indian Air Force flew over two hundred sorties in that war, and there are reports of several aircraft returning home on a single engine.

The last Marut was retired from active service in 1990. Considering its rich history and also the fact that one of the HF 24 Marut aircraft is displayed in the Nehru Science Centre, at the time of its restoration, I researched this aircraft and have told its full story on my blog;

The HF 24 – Marut Fighter Aircraft](https://khened.blogspot.com/2020/11/the-hf-24-marut-fighter-aircraft.html).

Nehru Science Centre in Mumbai proudly owns one of these aircraft, gifted by the IAF in 1978-79. During my tenure, it was restored to near-pristine beauty by a dedicated HAL Nashik team, who worked tirelessly on our campus during the COVID period.

The MiG-21 stepped in where the Marut fell short. India's first supersonic jet retired after 62 years of service, having been inducted in 870 units across variants. Some called the MIG 21 a flying coffin, but those who flew it, including our own senior Ajeet, Air Marshal Yajurvedi, who flew this aircraft, still speaks of it with deep affection, and recalls what a faithful workhorse it was. Its departure has left a gap.

Fighter squadron strength, understandably, has slipped to 29 against a sanctioned strength of 42. In the Air Chief's own assessment, the Tejas Mk1A programme is unfortunately running about two years behind schedule, and the IAF needs to induct roughly 36 to 40 fighters every year to arrest the slide.  The Tejas Mk1A is held up largely by late supply of F404 engines from GE Aerospace. Six decades after the Marut, the engine is again the bottleneck.

The way forward is clear: we must learn from past lessons of the significance of the engine and how it impacted the Marut. We should therefore secure engine supply and give a major impetus to the Kaveri and other indigenous engine efforts with the urgency that was found wanting in the 1960s, and we must also overcome any other bureaucratic or other issues to ensure that indigenous engines ultimately fly our Tejas fighter aircraft.  

It is also perhaps time that, to meet HAL's delivery targets as per Air Force demands, it may also be necessary that private sectors are encouraged to improve production capacity. It is also heartening to note that the 114 Rafale deal could conclude by the end of this financial year, and that the Tejas Mk2 is targeted to fly in mid-2027.

Another significant development for the Indian Air Force is India’s ambitious fifth-generation stealth fighter project, Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA). This project has reached the RFP stage, and the AMCA is expected to become the centrepiece of India’s future air combat strategy in an era increasingly dominated by stealth fighter capability

The Marut fighter aircraft taught us that India can design and build a fighter on its own. However, for the success of such projects, we must also understand that no aircraft is better than the engine that drives the aircraft, and therefore adequate emphasis must be given to indigenous development of the engines. If we learn from our past lessons from the Marut aircraft, the next chapter of Indian air power can truly match our aspirations.

Happy Air Force Day. Jai Hind.