India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is adding inspectors and other technical personnel to address year-old and still-unresolved audit findings that led the FAA to downgrade the country’s International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) rating to Category 2. The downgrade, announced Jan. 31, means that Air India and Jet Airways cannot expand service to the U.S., nor can they add U.S. code-share deals to existing flights. The carriers currently combine for 28 weekly flights between the two countries, including 21 by Air India.
As efforts to strengthen India's defense-industrial base have fallen far short of the country's self-reliance target, the military is continuing to look abroad for its defense hardware. That is encouraging to international equipment manufacturers from the U.S., Russia, France, Israel, the U.K. and Germany, which have been establishing relationships in India to sell aircraft, tanks, howitzers, unmanned aerial vehicles, combat vehicles, missiles, infantry weapons, submarines and support equipment.
