Excerpt taken from an official company document from earlier this year:
Either the wording “Indian variant” is basically a discrete way of saying ‘Stage 2 prototypes’…or the differences between the Russian and Indian types is more fundamental than just ‘source code’.

Could it be that India is asking for a version build upon PAK-FA base version plus with sorting out glitches (by induction in Russian AF), system and algorithms mature with time plus changing of few sub-systems here are there.

I dont know why people pick one paragraph from the whole article … point here is not to trash other nation’s efforts but to learn from their mistakes/short comings with/without real data at hand. Assume something based on our limited knowledge and try to design something better and perform wind tunnel tests. Lets see what comes out …

This line of argument of trainer jet or radome are plain arrogance to say least… lets see where India will be during next 10-15 years as compared to other nations technology wise.

They bought 24 and 36 planes I believe with weopons, support and training. so why do you think there training will be less? same French instructors will be teaching them in advance simulators. both of them has used western planes for decades and I believe there crash rate is far less than IAF even for M2k.
TOT is separate issue. it has nothing to do with purchasing planes.

Like I said your logic flawed. You don’t see a difference then what is the point to discuss
– between end numbers at one time; 200 vs 24/36
– Heavily used for training, developing tactics, pushing the planes to limits to find out +ve/-ve vs training on sims and flying within specified envelops.
– Deployments against competent air force (China/Pak) vs bombing insurgents.
– Planning for intense war fighting vs showing flying skills to fans

Sorry, I don’t have enough time to respond to each line.

You will be inducting Rafale 20 years later than French airforce. There is nothing wrong inducting T-50 10 years later than Ruaf. infact India has inducted C-17/C-130 at tail end of production.

By 2030… AMCA or whatever new name will enter into early SP. Slowly we are reducing imports and it will continue to decrease.

Hard attitude of French, caused India to reduce its intension to order from 200 to 36 planes. At the most it could go up 54. If French wants to win profit with hard bargain, so India wants to save money as we are not super rich country.

Similarly Russian, wants to have 6 billion only for development without India involvement. And it caused us to lower our intension to order.

So you can keep bringing unrelated discussion without any added value.

Only a fool would imagine that the political maneuvers and machinations of 2015 have any bearing on the number of FGFAs India will ultimately acquire.

The precise number of T-50s India will ultimately acquire will be decided no earlier than the late 2020s, and probably some way into the 2030s.

If 2015 have any signs then I doubt there will be any FGFA. If PAK-FA is not inducted in IAF before 2025 then what is the point of having it at the first place.

Things will get clear, lets wait till Dec, 2015.

The F-35 is operational. Its initial operational capacity ‘IOC’ was announced last week.

I mean FOC. Would anyone here consider LCA operational as it also got IOC? 😉

It expensive to shot down such toys planes. Anyway, it give a reason to shot down anything cross into Indian border.

But a side note, what is the big thing … all countries spy on each other.

I avoided to reply your post but BlackArcher’s reply and your counter reply … might trigger another JF-17 vs Tejas flame war. I have stated my PoV in few sentence and I stick to that

IAF would be more than happy for someone to take the current batch off their hands. Maybe India can also do a very cheap deal for political reasons.

Their opinion values a lot on the operational and in professional domain. But it comes to procurement, it is MoD and GoI decision. There is no “very cheap deal“, it is national interests. If GoI think it is more important to first arm SL then India then so be it.

Chinese fighters are already flying in India’s east, west and south (China itself in North)

Capability wise neither it has serious implications nor pose threat to India. It does not hurt India if China arm twist them in some event or have feel good factor by publishing some PR pictures.

China themselves just started producing mature planes which is a cause of concern for us. I don’t see them selling those to anyone else in next decade or two. It will be foolish but we don’t know. e.g. if they can sell/ share nuclear and missile know-how to Pakistan and North Korea, anything is possible. Lets wait and watch.

Not sure if internal politics in India will let HAL sell fighter jets to Sri Lanka though.

With the rise of the national level party, local political parties have lost their unnecessary importance. My simple view is we have to put every frame in the IAF colors for next decade plus then any other color. But if GoI think it is more important to first arm some other nation then India then so be it.