Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar was at the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) in Bangalore today to witness the first test flight of Hindustan Turbo Trainer-40 (HTT-40), country's indigenous basic trainer aircraft, and the minister was impressed with the efforts of young HAL techies.

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The two-seater aircraft designed and developed by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited was flown by Group Captain C Subramaniam and Group Captain Venugopal for about 10 to 15 minutes at the HAL Airport.



After the test flight at the HAL base, Parrikar got into the cockpit of the trainer jet to get a closer look of the aircraft. "I request them to bring it still earlier, by the beginning of 2018, so that they can go into serial production in 2018 itself," Parrikar said.

"When I came here in March 2015, they had promised me within one year they will fly the aircraft. I am happy that they have kept the assurance," the Defence Minister added.

#WATCH: Inaugural flight of India's indigenous basic trainer aircraft, HTT-40 in Bengaluruhttps://t.co/Wm9GsvFZlc ANI (@ANI_news) June 17, 2016

ALL ABOUT HTT 40:

Aimed at being used for the first stage training for all flying cadets of the three services, HTT-40 had made its maiden flight after much delay on May 31. Officials said detailed design phase of HTT-40 was launched in August 2013 with HAL's internal funding and was completed in May 2015 and from there it has taken 12 months to fly the first prototype. Indian Air Force is expected to procure seventy HTT-40 aircraft. HAL has said that the programme aims to achieve its operational clearance by 2018, and towards this the company will be manufacturing three prototypes and two static test specimens. Designed to meet the current demands of the Air force, there is also a provision to include weapons for the trainer aircraft. According to officials, the indigenous content on HTT-40 is close to 80 per cent with about 75 plus systems out of the total 90 on the aircraft sourced from local players and sister divisions of HAL. HTT-40 aircraft weighs about 2,800 kg and has Turbo Prop engine of 950 shp class.

My congratulations to the brilliant young team of technocrats at HAL. #HTT40 pic.twitter.com/kEmGhht9zN June 17, 2016