BY ANOOP PREMACHANDRAN

Last year while the country was confronting the hardships caused due to Covid pandemic, Govt of India announced a visionary strategy of Atmanirbhar Bharat in conjunction with ‘Make in India’ programme. Such a grand scale thrust on indigenous products was very welcome to provide a boost to economic and industrial sectors of India in the international arena. The Indian aerospace industry has marched on from an old concept of “best in the industry” towards “excellence in industry”. Now we are moving to Atmanirbhar Bharat or self-reliance and eventually would achieve highly sustainable aircrafts, air systems, aero engines and its associated components from our own Bharat.

Indian Defence Aerospace Industry – A Flying Success

Self reliance or Aatmanirbharta is the need of the hour. Thanks to several Indian Industrial giants, brand India has steadily gathered a staunch value for money and product reliability. Indian Aerospace industry too has embraced indigenisation despite several technological and management hurdles. Aircrafts made by HAL, started taking to skies way back in 1951. Since then, our Indian aeronautical industry has grown by leaps and bounds. Indian Defence Aero industry depicts glory of its indigenisation by the name ‘Tejas’ (LCA)- an advanced fighter jet. Aerospace cluster is on a constant path of booming success. Aatmanirbharta revolution kick-started by the GoI, has shifted gears with full throttle. Defence Agencies like DRDO, CEMILAC, DGAQA and NAL have come together and developed several advanced versions of defence Indigenous Light combat/Utility Helicopters, aero engines, components, airborne systems and Transporter aircrafts SARAS. Advanced air systems like UAVs and Drones designed are under final testing and show promising results. The participation of several Indian manufacturers and private players is the key highlight of this success.

Quality Evolution a Foundation to Atmanirbharta

Since the medieval times, the world understood the importance of Quality in the finished products. The very conceptualisation of HAL back in 1950s, and Vikram Sarabhai Space centre in 1963in itself were a few golden steps towards self-reliance in the Aeronautical industry. Quality improvement and advanced techniques were swiftly adopted to become the best in the industry. Today we have multiple levels of Quality standards like AS9100D, Indian Military standards, procedures and guidelines issued by Regulatory agencies etc. in place to ensure safety and achieve reliable results.

Continual Quality Improvement- Nirantar badlav for Nirbhar Utpaad

Light Combat Aircraft -Tejas is the best branded masterpiece indigenous Atmanirbhar product, our Indian Defence aeronautical industry has seen in the skies today. A seamless amalgamation of various Indian Organisations like ADA-DRDO, HAL, DGAQA, CEMILAC and IAF/Navy and their concerted efforts is the crux of its success. The point of admiration is about the plenty of mistakes made during the development of LCA-Tejas and the earnest intent by all the concerned to quickly rectify and reset the course back on track with continued product improvement. The latest news bit of LCA Tejas stealing the limelight during Dubai air show reflects the formidable spirit of Atmanirbharta of Indian defence aerospace industry. HAL indigenously developed LUH/LCH helicopters with supreme performance capabilities are the sweet fruits of years of hard work and unmatched feat of Indian aero-industry calibre.

Doubtful “Desi” Vs Reliable “Made in India” Product – A complete change in mind-set
Over the years of industrial growth in our country, a strange sense of suspicion on our own abilities and hence on the quality of our own products had got imprinted in our psyche. This led to injecting further stringent Quality checks to rule out any slightest possible doubt on the product. I would like to call this as a blessing in disguise. The more our own products were being subjected to rigorous testing, the greater it boosted our confidence. Subsequently, this enhanced reliability of our present day products and satisfactory Customer experience. While we were importing finished foreign products from best OEMs around the world, we kept our focus on reverse engineering for breaking the dependency at some point of time. In this bargain, our quest for superior grade material to superior processes and technology has yielded results in manufacturing products which are fabulous than the OEMs. What more can we ask for, if our customers are happy about a made in India product.

Quality Ownership

Drops of water makes an ocean. Holistic Atmanirbharta is achieved by collating specific individual contributions. The baseline is “my product” or “my process” should be reliable and compatible. Imagine a scenario where all our individual assigned tasks is so perfectly achieved that it would not require any more re-work, checks or introspection. Imagine the complete process where the combination of such perfect individual process would give rise to a total perfect product. Imagine the benefits such a perfect process would provide in terms of financial profits and ease of efforts. However this concept is just theoretical. But our intent towards achieving close to this total perfection can be given a try. When “my work” or “my process” is reliable, it will add to the final product’s reliability. And thus the Indian Atmanirbharta vision would soon be a reality.

Quality Upgrade in Industry 4.0– Gateway to Atmanirbharta

Quality in parlance of Industry 4.0 is an all-encompassing concept. Industry in general has come ages away from old quality aspects which used to be a separate activity or a separate department. Instead in Industry 4.0, Quality aspects are absorbed into the design stage itself. The tedious job of inspection is eliminated due to perfection in process by automation and near zero scope of errors.

Many of our imported or licensed products are on the brink of obsolescence. While variants of aircrafts, machinery and components are ageing, present level technology is racing towards sophistication and automation. To mitigate the threat of abrupt phasing out, we welcome the benefits of Upgrade projects. It is also a necessity to hand hold the small scale companies and vendors who support the repair and maintenance of ageing components. Despite several powerful and disruptive technologies prevailing in the industry, due to binding constraints, we have to blend obsolescence with upgrade while providing best of the advanced features well before phasing out of products. Technology Upgradation and production of Mirage, Jaguar, Dornier and Su-30 projects of IAF with the support of HAL, BEL, BDL and numerous other private players were blended well. A perfect concurrent engineering programme displayed a giant leap towards self-reliance in upgrading our ageing aircrafts with futuristic weaponry. The gradual reduction in dependency on foreign vendors showed our best capabilities in achieving atmanirbharta.

Atmanirbharta – A Way of Life Ahead

With companies and sectors racing ahead in technological sphere, it would not be wise to indigenise all the components from the scratch. Exchange of ideas, technologies and finished products between OEMs and countries presents multi-faceted benefits in terms of cost cutting, resource optimisation and Skill-talent advantage. The best way forward is to have a clear vision to upscale our technological skills to achieve self-reliance as Atmanirbharta is here to stay. Our own products should, not only earn us a living but also make us proud. Our products should not just, achieve customer satisfaction but also should provide an extra delight. As our product speaks of its quality and reliability, we can truly sit back and say that we are proud Atmanirbhar Bharat.

The author is presently serving as Scientific Officer in DGAQA. The views expressed in this article are personal. For any further query kindly drop an email at: 123anoop.chandran@gmail.com

(This article is published in Aviation World Jan-Feb 22 Print+Digital Edition)