The tragic Air India plane crash that happened on June 12, 2025 in Ahmedabad claimed more than 250 lives. Over 20 people, apart from those on board lost their lives. The plane that crashed was a 787 Dreamliner manufactured by the American company Boeing.
The plane crashed in less than minute after take-off. As the authorities are investigating the reasons of the crash, several theories of possible causes of crash are floating around. According to some theories a bird hit the plane, while others are claiming that both the engines of the plane failed which was why it could not fly.
The black box, the device that records the data of the plane, has been recovered from the accident site. Additionally, many other devices have been recovered, which will be used to ascertain cause of the accident. However, the process may take a few months or even a year.
Meanwhile, fingers are being pointed at Boeing, which has a poor track record on safety. The company’s 737 Max aircraft has been involved in frequent accidents. The Boeing planes that met with accidents had some technical problems, as claimed by a Boeing employee. He claimed that faulty Dreamliner planes were given to Air India.
Whether there will be a course correction will be revealed over time. But the plane crash has once again given rise to the calls for strengthening the aerospace industry in India. Like most of the planes, Boeing 787 was not made in India. More than 90% of the civil aircraft in India are not made here. This does not mean that the aircrafts made in India will never crash.
The point of the argument is that we will have control over the aircraft that we build in India. We will be able to control and regulate various aspects of the process of building of an aircraft, from manufacturing, and certification to the technologies used.
In case of Boeing, it was found that serious negligence has been going on for years unaddressed. Possibly, this may not happen if we build aircrafts in India. Although conspiracy theories should not be readily trusted, but companies like Boeing run on profits.
If it is proved that the accident happened due to a technical fault of Boeing, then the company will suffer losses worth billions of dollars. But, if it is found that the accident happened was caused by some mistake of the pilots, Boeing will get off scot-free.
It is not necessary that this will happen, but big American companies have been caught influencing investigations in the past. Indian pilots are considered as professionals in the world, putting the blame for the accident on them will create another problem.
The Ahmedabad accident might have been caused by the pilots’ error but this does not weaken the argument for strengthening the Indian aerospace industry. We have suffered much in the past because of our reliance on foreign airlines.
In 2023, India’s local airline Go First was shut down after the Pratt & Whitney engines in its planes, which were bought from Airbus, malfunctioned. Dozens of GoFirst planes were grounded. However, the engine company, Pratt & Whitney, did not heed repeated requests leading to shutting down of an Indian airline without any fault.
GoFirst is not the only victim, a report by NITI Ayog said that, at present, more than 130 aircraft are grounded owing to various problems. As a result, airlines are incurring losses worth crores on a daily basis.
Currently, around 800 passenger airlines provide services in India, the impact of all these grounded aircraft on the market can be easily understood. If 16% capacity of a market is reduced, the customer directly bears the losses.
The reason behind the grounding of most of these planes is technical and the key to fixing it lies in the hands of foreign companies. If we were manufacturing such planes in India, we would have probably have been aware of this situation before it arose. And, at least after such a problem had occurred, we would not have been staring at others for help.
Indian airlines have currently placed orders for about 1500 aircrafts. All these orders have been placed either with Boeing or Airbus. Due to this, countries like America, Britain, France and Germany have made benefits worth lakhs of crores. All this money can be saved by manufacturing aircrafts locally.
The problems do not exist only in passenger planes. There are more problems in planes bought for the Air Force or the Army. The Indian Air Force uses Russian IL 76 planes for cargo i.e. carrying military equipment.
There have been problems with these aircraft as well. Defence experts say that the lack of flight readiness of these aircraft is a major issue. Russia has not been able to solve these technical problems. Similarly, the India-made Tejas aircraft is dependent on engines supplied by American company General Electric. The supply of this engine has been delayed by one year, due to which the production of Tejas aircraft is stuck. The Air Force has already expressed concern about this. General Electric has to supply more than 100 engines, out of which it has not been able to supply even 10.
The list goes on and on. At the core of all this is one issue and that is lack of self-reliance. It is true that we are not yet technically capable of making planes like the Dreamliner or engines like those of General Electric. But this argument cannot go on forever.
We have to start somewhere. If we keep thinking like this, we will remain dependent on foreign countries. It is not that we have never done anything like this. Whether it is making a missile like Brahmos or building Tejas, whenever we have tried, we have been successful.
We need more such endeavours. The Ahmedabad plane accident is sad but it also teaches us that there is no alternative to self-reliance.
