The Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) today cleared the revival of India’s airborne early warning (AEW) system project, five years after it was scrapped following a test flight crash in January 1999. The project was formally revived two months ago. Sources at DRDO’s Centre for Airborne Systems (CABS), which developed the AEW, said while the heart of the system — the early warning radar — would be indigenously developed by DRDO’s Electronics & Radar Development Establishment in Bangalore, certain ‘‘grey areas’’ may be developed in collaboration with other countries. In January 1999, a test flight of the AEW, mounted on an HS-748 Avro aircraft, crashed between Vellore and Tambaram in Tamil Nadu, forcing CABS to shelve the project. Speaking to The Indian Express from Bangalore, a CABS staff officer involved with the old and new AEW projects said: ‘‘The project was revived two months ago. Last month, officials of the Indian Air Force and Defence Ministry, along with the Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister, visited us to formalise the revival of the project.’’ He added that a committee is currently studying various possible platforms for the revived project, but would not comment on whether it would be an IL-76 or Boeing platform. Certain non-critical areas of the AEW would possibly be developed in collaboration with other countries to make sure development does not take too long, he said. ‘‘When the test plane crashed in 1999, the project was almost complete. We had even received letters of congratulations from the PM and Defence Minister then. Now we will begin where we left off, and have only been awaiting financial sanction,’’ he said. South Block sources did not comment on the budget outlay for the project, but agency reports quoted ministry officials as saying that Rs 1,800 crore had been sanctioned over seven years for the project. Air Chief S. Krishnaswamy is currently in Israel, and has reviewed the progress of India’s procurement of three Phalcon early warning systems from the country. The Phalcon AWACS, which are expected to be here by 2007, are to be mounted on three Russian IL-76 aircraft. There are some doubts, though. ‘‘Phalcon systems may be coming but who knows when there is an emergency for spares? Building indigenous AWACS is the only way to safeguard against such emergencies,’’ a CABS source said. A year after the 1999 test flight crash, the Indian Air Force explored procurement of Russian A-50 AEWs, but trials of one aircraft leased to the IAF for 30 days proved the systems to be unsuitable, which is when India began looking for AWACS in Israel.
