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Defence Technology

AN-32 Aircraft (UPSC-RAS)

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The AN-32

  • Twin-engine turboprop tactical transport aircraft, acquired from the USSR in 1984.
  • Specs - max weight 27 tonnes, max speed 530 km/h, payload up to 6.7 tonnes or 50 passengers.
  • Designed for short-to-medium range operations from austere/far-flung airfields with minimal ground infrastructure valuable for high-altitude and border areas.

Strategic Role

  1. Backbone of IAF's tactical airlift: troop/cargo mobilisation, paratrooping, limited bombing role.
  2. Used extensively during the Kargil War (1999) and Operation Parakram (2001-02) for logistics to border regions.

Modernisation Programme

  • Triggered after a 2009 crash; India signed a $400-million deal with Ukraine's Antonov to upgrade 105 AN-32s (airframe overhaul, new turboprop engines, navigation/communication systems).
  • Stalled post-2014 after Russia's annexation of Crimea (since some systems were Russian-origin); later resumed with Ukraine developing alternatives to Russian components.
  • Upgrades carried out at IAF's Base Repair Depot (BRD), Kanpur, with equipment from Ukraine; about half the fleet upgraded, 38 at BRD. -Soviet-origin Transport Aircraft.