Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez will jointly inaugurate a Tata Aircraft Complex at Tata Advanced Systems Limited (TASL) in Vadodara on October 28. This particular plant would be for the making cooperation of Tata and Airbus for manufacturing C-295 military transport aircrafts for military which would be the historical step in “Make in India” policy of the country in aviation industry. The project includes the production of 56 aircraft: While 16 of them will be shipped directly from Spain by Airbus, the rest 40 will be manufactured in India by TASL.
The facility at Vadodara shall be the first greenfield final assembly line for military aircraft in the country in the private sector and will have all the cycles of the C-295 covers from manufacturing, assembly testing and serviceability. Besides Tata the Indian defense public sector units like herbal Bharat Electronics and Bharat Dynamics also MSMEs will be participating in the program and thus supporting a complete framework.
It is in line with an Rs 21,935 crore contract signed between the Indian Ministry of Defence and Airbus in 2021 to boost its defence industry. Airbus has supplied six C-295 aircraft to the IAF, the seventh is planned to be supplied by the year end. The first fully Indigenous C-295 is expected September 2026 with 40 Indian assembled aircraft planned to be produced by 2031. These aircraft will phase out the Avro fleet of the IAF and improve operational preparedness along sensitive borders particularly with China.
The foundation stone for the Vadodara plant was first initiated by PM Modi in October 2022 and once operative, the IAF will emerge as the largest operator of C-295 planes across the world.
Sanish Prime minister Sanchez whom made his first official visit to India in 18 years, seeks to enhance cooperation in the defence and security, trade, renewable energy and technology. India and Spain are good friends and have exchanged diplomatic relations since 1956; the relations are friendly and this friendship is expected to diversify through this partnership.
