Philippines likely to be 1st customer of LCH Prachand

Bengaluru: After delivering Dornier-228 aircraft to Guyana, the Indian Aerospace maker Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) is confident it will soon have the breakthrough deal in the fighter jet and helicopter segments. The talks with the Philippines are in advanced stages, and Nigeria is gaining momentum.

HAL Chief Managing Director CB Ananthakrishnan, however, is more hopeful of getting a helicopter export before that for the indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas. This is despite the present Indian government throwing its weight behind LCA ‘Tejas’ through an unprecedented sortie in the aircraft by the Prime Minister.

In an interview, the HAL CMD said that the LCA ‘Tejas’ being the best in its category has evoked a lot of interest from foreign buyers.

“Five-six countries have shown interest. With Argentina, it is still under discussion. Talks with the Philippines are in advanced stages. With Egypt also we are in discussion. And talks with Nigeria have gained momentum,” Ananthakrishnan said, without elaborating if the specific countries were interested in the fighter jets or the helicopters.

Earlier this year, the Philippines media was abuzz with HAL offering the local assembly of the LCA Mk1 Naval variant to the island country. There have been reports in the Philippines media that the HAL has offered a local assembly of Tejas Mk1 at Philippine Aerospace Development Corp (PADC). Along with the willingness to provide local assembly of the naval strike variant, India offers soft loans to the archipelagic country to modernize its armed forces.

The Philippines was the first foreign customer of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile. It remains to be seen if it will be the first to buy the LCA MK1A as well.

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