The rotary-wing market for just the military helicopters presents a mouth-watering picture for helicopter manufacturers around the world

While the IAF has continued to strive to maintain a balanced helicopter force for the multifarious tasks, it is required to carry out routinely, the other two wings of the armed forces namely, the Indian Army and the Navy—having appreciated the utility of these versatile machines—are seeking to acquire helicopters in much greater numbers. The turn of the millennium witnessed a great surge in the requirement of helicopters by all three services; nudging the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to go into a high-drive by approving in principle the cumulative acquisition of as many as 695 helicopters by the defence forces. Clearly, this has opened up a huge market for the manufacturers of helicopters worldwide—both domestic and abroad—as the requirement includes all possible types of helicopters.

The IAF will be the biggest procurer of rotarywing assets to meet its varied tasks. The process has already commenced with the IAF starting to acquire Russian-built medium-lift Mi-17 V-5 (also known as Mi-171) out of an initial order of 80 units valued at $1.2 billion (Rs. 5,400 crore). The IAF is reportedly going in for another 40-60 with the total package coming close to or even exceeding $2 billion (Rs. 9,000 crore). In addition, deliveries of the indigenous advanced light helicopter (ALH) Dhruv continue with a total induction of 54 units (38 utility and 16 armed versions). The IAF is also in the market for 22 attack helicopters and 15 heavy-lift helicopters for which RFPs had been issued earlier to the global manufacturers from both side of the Atlantic. In this context, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) has gone ahead to the extent of having notified the Congress on December 22 last year of a foreign military sale (FMS) to the Government of India of a possible direct commercial sale (DCS) of 22 Boeing AH-64D Block III Apache helicopters package worth $1.4 billion. Similarly, Boeing is also confident of bagging the IAF’s order of 15 heavy-lift helicopters with its offering of CH-47F Chinook which may also be sold to India through the FMS route. Together, the two contracts are likely to exceed $2 billion (Rs. 9,000 crore).