Defence ministry to sign Rs 21,000 cr deal for 230 Sukhoi jet engines

New Delhi: The defence ministry is set to ink an estimated ₹21,000 crore deal to acquire jet engines for its Su 30MKI fighter fleet. The engines will be made in India from the raw material stage by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) and will replace older engines that are coming to the end of their service life.

The order for about 230 engines will be placed in the coming days, with deliveries to take place over the next few years, said people familiar with the matter.. The total requirement of the AL 31 FP engines is close to 950 as they power the entire fleet of the twin-engine Su 30MKI fighter, they said.

The engines are being made by HAL under a licence arrangement with a high level of localisation. A large part of the order value is expected to be passed on to the vendor and supplier base created by HAL over the years.


In addition to the new engines, the mainstay Su 30MKI fighter jet fleet is set to be upgraded under a plan that will include completely new avionics, radars and electronic warfare suites. Close to 100 of the fighters are to be upgraded in the first tranche that will be conducted entirely in India.

The upgrade plan is valued in excess of ₹60,000 crore and HAL will be the lead agency for the upgrade in partnership with the Indian Air Force and other partners. India had ordered 272 of the fighter jets from Russia that form the mainstay of the air force fighter fleet. An order for 12 more jets valued at close to ₹11,000 crore, to replace aircraft lost to accidents, has also been cleared by the defence ministry but is yet to be inked.

ET had earlier reported that HAL is also close to signing a deal with American engine manufacturer GE Aviation to produce advanced jet engines under a technology transfer deal. The GE 414 engines will power the next version of the Tejas light combat aircraft as well as other future programmes.