India’s increasing sales taxes on air tickets are negatively affecting the country’s civil aviation industry, warn aviation experts. “While taxes provide a tangible short-term revenue boost to the government coffers, increased taxes in the long term can be outweighed by the cost to the underlying economy,” aviation finance expert Charles Tyler says.

NEW DELHI — India has selected the Swiss Pilatus PC-7 aircraft as its beginning trainer for Indian Air Force (IAF) pilots. The Swiss aircraft, along with Grob’s G-120 TP, Embraer’s EMB-312 Super Tucano, Finmeccanica’s M-311, Hawker Beechcraft’s T-6C Texan-II and Korean Aerospace’s KT-1, participated in the flight trials last year. “Of the three short-listed firms from the U.S., Korea and Switzerland, the bid made by Pilatus has emerged the lowest,” says India’s chief of air staff, Air Marshal P.V. Naik.

NEW DELHI — India may ground the MiG-29KUB in the wake of the twin-seat carrier-based fighter crashing in Russia on June 23. “We have sought clarifications from [Russian Aircraft Corp.] as the aircraft was still with them and was being flown by their own pilots,” says India’s naval chief, Adm. Nirmal Verma. “At the moment, we have not received any feedback, but if there is a technical reason that demands grounding, we will do that.”