The deal to upgrade the existing fleet of 51 Mirage-2000s would be finalised in the coming financial year.
Talking to reporters on the second day of the eighth edition of Aero India, Air Chief Marshal PV Naik said India and France had moved closer to the deal in December 2010. The deal has been hanging fire for close to three years after it was cleared by the ministry of defence’s defence acquisition council during French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s first visit to India in January 2008.
The deal involves integration of advanced multimode pulse doppler radar and fire-and-forget missiles, jointly by French Dassault and Thales along with Indian DPSU Hindustan Aeronautics Limited. Other features, as given out by Air Marshal R K Sharma on Thursday, include modern glass cockpit, new avionics, EW equipment, new weapons and sensors.
AESA radar to replace passive one
The Sukhoi-30 MKI upgrade would include integration of the AESA radar on it, to be jointly done by Russia, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited and Defence Research and Development Organisation.
