Welcome back to India Defence Online...If you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the RSS feed as it will save you a lot of time. Thanks for following the site!
The latest report of India’s auditing agency, Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) submitted to the Indian Parliament last week states that the Indian Army inducted 40 Advanced Light Helicopters (ALH) at a cost of about $356 million which cannot fly above 5,000 meters due to technical shortcomings. The ALH had been designed for the Army and the Indian Air Force by the state owned Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) to fly up to 20,000 feet (over 6000 meters).
The CAG report says even the upgraded ALH which is powered by a high thrust engine has not been delivered to the Indian defence forces. The CAG report cautions that the inability to acquire suitable ALHs timely has led to considerable delay in de-induction of old fleet of Cheetah and Chetak helicopters. This can further deteriorate the operational preparedness of the Army, especially in high altitude areas in forward locations like Siachen in Kashmir. The Indian Army has to rely on the homemade ALH for movement of troops and logistics in operational areas under harsh weather conditions.
The Indian Defence Ministry cleared the purchase of 105 ALH helicopters in addition to the 40 in operation in 2007. However, the condition was that the later ALH must be upgraded with the newly developed Shakti engine which has a higher thrust.
The CAG report further quoted a HAL official who indicated that even the Shakti engine has some technical problems. It is unclear whether the 105 ALH will be without the technical flaws, says the report. The Army Aviation (Maintenance Advisory Group) at HAL Bangalore, has already stated in September 2008 that Shakti engine under development had deficiency in power and necessary improvements were underway. Therefore, it is not yet certain whether another 105 ALH ordered in December 2007 would be free of shortcomings.
State-owned HAL had projected an export order of around 120 ALHs in the next 10 years but the latest report is making that a grim possibility. Recently, Chile had turned down the Indian ALH and opted for 12 light transport helicopters from Bell Helicopter. However, India has managed to supply the ALH to Ecuador, Peru, Turkey and Nepal in small numbers.
The CAG report insinuated that the qualitative requirements (QR) of the Indian defence forces had been watered down to facilitate HAL from the beginning. The ALH project was approved in 1984 for design and development by HAL in collaboration with M/s Turbomeca, France. The project was completed in June 2001 and in September 1995, the Army projected a requirement of 99 helicopters to be inducted by 2007 which was later scaled down to 40. The ALH was not able to fly above 5000 metres, though the Army’s requirement stipulated up to 6,500 metres. The shortcomings of the ALH were due to the engines and its vibration level not being within the acceptable limits. Despite the shortcomings, four ALHs were accepted by the Army and an order for eight more was placed to sustain the production lines of HAL.
India is also on a hunt in the international market for the purchase of 197 multi utility helicopters to replace the Cheetah and Chetak.
No related posts.
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
