OPINION | Modernising the Indian Air Force: Strategic priorities and implementation framework

Modernising the Indian Air Force (IAF) is no longer about just buying more fighters; it is about redesigning the way India generates, sustains, and employs airpower in a two-front, high-technology battlespace. The real problem is not simply a “numbers gap”, but an institutional and ecosystem gap between India’s strategic ambitions and the way its airpower capability is conceived, funded, acquired and integrated. Reframing the core problem Public discourse usually reduces IAF modernisation to “42 squadrons vs 30-31 today”, and the race to induct Rafales, Tejas variants and a future MRFA. While this quantitative shortfall is serious, it is the symptom…