IAF plane crash puts spotlight on ageing Jaguar fighter jet: Are these planes too old to fly?

The Indian Air Force (IAF) has lost two pilots today (July 9) after a Jaguar fighter jet crashed near Bhanuda village in Rajasthan’s Churu district. A police official said that the aircraft crashed in an agriculture field in Bhanoda village around 1.25 pm on Wednesday, after it took off from the Suratgarh airbase.

The IAF has confirmed that both pilots on board suffered fatal injuries. “An IAF Jaguar Trainer aircraft met with an accident during a routine training mission and crashed near Churu in Rajasthan, today. Both pilots sustained fatal injuries in the accident,” wrote the IAF on X.

Notably, this is the third Jaguar plane to crash this year — earlier, the IAF’s Jaguar crashed in Gujarat in April, killing one pilot, while another one crashed in Haryana in March.

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The crashes once again highlights the issues related to the aging plane and the challenges posed by their overall maintenance, repair and overhaul.

Jaguars, the work horse of the IAF

The SEPECAT Jaguar was first introduced in 1968, was a joint venture between the British Aircraft Corporation and the French Breguet Company to develop a new supersonic jet trainer for the French Air Force and Royal Air Force.

Originally, it was conceived to be a jet trainer with a light ground attack capability, but was later changed to include supersonic performance, reconnaissance and tactical nuclear strike roles. Today, it is a two-seater fighter aircraft with the ability to carry a variety of missiles, including air-to-air options, like the AIM-9 Sidewinder, ASRAAM, and R.550 Magic.

In 1979, India acquired the Jaguars, christening them as Shamsher (meaning Sword of Justice in Persian). When the first two Jaguars were inducted into the IAF on July 27, 1979, Group Captain Kapil Bhargava noted in an article for Air Forces Monthly that it marked the beginning of a new era in the IAF’s aviation capabilities.

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The Jaguar soon earned a reputation as a low-level deep penetration strike specialist — this jet played a significant role in reconnaissance and high-altitude precision targeting support during the Kargil War in 1999. Even in the Balakot air strikes of 2019 , the IAF used the Jaguar aircraft as decoys to bait the Pakistan air force’s F-16 and move them away from the intended target area.

Today, the IAF operates approximately 120 Jaguar jets in six squadrons.

Jaguar’s chequered legacy in the IAF

While the Jaguar has become a critical element of the IAF’s fleet, it is not without its issues.

In 2025, there have already been three crashes involving the plane. On March 7, a Jaguar fighter jet crashed shortly after taking off from the Ambala airbase in Haryana. The remains of the ill-fated aircraft were scattered all over in the forest area on the hilly terrain near Raipur Rani in the Panchkula district of Haryana close to the Haryana-Himachal Pradesh border.

An official statement by the IAF read, “A Jaguar aircraft of the IAF crashed at Ambala during a routine training sortie today, after encountering a system malfunction. The pilot maneuvered the aircraft away from any habitation on the ground before ejecting safely. An inquiry has been ordered by the IAF to ascertain the cause of the accident.”

Fortunately, the pilot escaped the crash with minimal injuries.

A little less than a month later, on April 2, another Jaguar crashed near Jamnagar Airfield during a night mission, claiming the life of Flight Lieutenant Siddharth Yadav . According to the IAF’s official statement, both pilots ejected after detecting the failure, ensuring the jet crashed in an open field instead of populated areas. However, despite the ejection, Flight Lieutenant Yadav succumbed to his injuries.

Sources said that in the past, there have been multiple incidents involving the Jaguar as this fleet of aircraft has suffered over 50 major and minor incidents in its 45-year service with the IAF, some of which have been fatal.

Challenges the IAF faces in flying Jaguars

The crash on Wednesday once again raises questions if the Jaguar is indeed too old to fly. In fact, India’s Air Force is the only major air force that still operates Jaguars; countries like Britain, France, Ecuador, Nigeria and Oman, which once had Jaguars in their fleet, have retired them long ago, with some jets put on display in air museums.

Experts note that many of the crashes involving the Jaguar fighter jet was a result of failures in the Rolls-Royce/Turbomeca Adour Mk 804 and Mk 811 engines. Many experts note that one of the biggest concerns with these engines is the thrust output, which is inadequate in India’s hot-and-high flying conditions, especially from forward air bases near the Himalayas. As The Print notes in a report, the engines struggle with performance during critical mission phases such as take-off, climb, and low-level manoeuvring under full payload conditions.

Moreover, the availability of spare parts for the Mk 804/811 engines has become a serious logistical bottleneck.

Tim Davis, a former Royal Air Force instructor in an IRDW report stated, “Even with engine and avionics upgrades, you still face issues with airframe fatigue. There’s only so much of an aircraft you can replace.

“It comes down this: even one pilot death is a tragedy. And the older the aircraft gets, the higher the risks.”

IAF’s dwindling strength

The IAF has plans to phase out the Jaguar from its fleet by 2031. However, delays in acquiring the HAL Tejas Mk2, Rafale, and the MRFA (Multi-Role Fighter Aircraft), has forced the IAF to exnted the life of this ageing plane.

Today, the IAF is already short on its fighter squadrons from a sanctioned strength of 42.5 to just 30 jets presently. In fact, in February, Air Chief Marshal AP Singh highlighted the shortage of fighter jets, ruing the delays in the procurement of critical military platforms. He added that the Indian Air Force is “very badly off in numbers”, pointing out that it must induct 40 fighter jets every year to stay combat ready.

“We have fleets that will be phased out in the next five to 10 years. Those fleets will have to be replaced with new aircraft, and we already have vacancies available (shortfall). We are looking at 35 to 40 aircraft a year being produced somewhere. I understand capacities cannot come up overnight, but we need to start pushing ourselves towards that,” he was quoted as saying.

With inputs from agencies