On the occasion of 20th anniversary of Tejas LCA's first flight, here are some interesting tidbits about the first flight from AM P Rajkumar's book The Tejas Story for all Tejas fans.

4 Jan 2001 was a nervous day for the entire Indian Aviation Community for obvious reasons.
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Wg Cdr Rajiv Kothiyal (Kothi) earned the golden opportunity to write his name in the history of the Indian Aviation. He was chosen to fly the LCA for the very first time. True to the reputation of the Test Pilots he was one cool customer on that tense day.

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Only the #Avgeeks would appreciate such trivia.

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The confidence about the Aircraft was high. But no doubt everyone was equally nervous about the first true test of the program.

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A lot of rigor and huge amount of details are under consideration for every test flight. But course first flight of any aircraft is much more special. No stone was left unturned in order to make sure every small detail was being monitored closely by specialist eyes.

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Our own @Nambitiger1 Sir was flying the primary chase aircraft, a Mirage 2000. What a day and what a memory for Nambi Sir. He must be really proud and happy today. And so are we all.

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After the agonizingly long and arduous few minutes of automated pre-flight system checks, (which if had failed two consecutive times, would have forced the flight to cancel) the green light finally lit. It was all Good-to-go...!

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The LCA lined up for its maiden take off while the chasing Mirages were taking up their position in the air.

I am sure everyone must have held their breath. All the hard work was being tested in the real world. All the dreams were riding on the success of this one flight.

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And the moment of truth was here. There she went rolling down the runway, roaring, then took off and climbed away majestically. That must have been a sight to behold. Everyone must have been relieved and overjoyed, watching the White Bird climb.

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But, wait, everything wasn't alright. Soon the telemetry data went all haywire. The Flight Control Center had no idea what was happening. WC Kothi reported the LCA was flying just fine. With no visible issue with the aircraft, the mission was allowed to continue.

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AM PRajkumar's words "I aged a lot in those few seconds" say alot. A lot was riding on the success of this one flight. There was already stiff opposition from many quarters and a lot of negativity and challenges had to be overcome just to be reach to this point.

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Any major mishap during this first flight would have set the program back by years and a crash would have been a death nail for the program. So the gravity of the situation is indeed much more than what it might seem like. But all went well for once.

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The first flight went exactly as it was expected thereafter with the aircraft handling exatly like it did in the Flight Simulator, which was a testimony to LCA's accurate FCS.

While the Aircraft started approaching the runway, suddenly the telemetry also came back.

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Now it was time for another breathless moment when first Landing was about to happen.

But WC Kothi executed a flawless landing. The first flight lasted only about 18 min but it indeed heralded a new era for the Indian Aviation.

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Apart from the incidence with telemetry, it was a textbook flight with all systems "perfarmance naarmal" and no anomolies noticed by the Pilot whatsoever.

Tejas passed its first test in flying colors. A well deserved celebration was followed of course.

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Even the issue with telemetry was traced to a rather hilarious root cause. It risked canceling of the flight but luckily it didn't do any serious damage. Lesson learnt.

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The historic work that WC Kothi did on the LCA Tejas program, earned him the prestigious Ivan Kinchloe Award meant for the TPs.

AM Rajkumar's words have let out the anguish about the unfair treatment that the TPs have typically got in India. We are good at worshipping
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wrong heroes in India. The real heroes are often ignored. But at the very least WC Kothiyal and thru him, team LCA's efforts were globally recognized for once and placed them among the company of some of the most iconic TPs and programs in the Aerospace History.
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Its been 20yrs and Tejas has maintained its flawless flight record till date (touchwood). The program and the Country as a whole have come a long way in last 20yrs. Lot has been achieved. But we need far more efforts to be put in in order for India to take its rightful

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place among the Aviation powers as AM Rajkumar had dreamed. No amount of begging or borrowing is going to make that happen. Only an exclusive focus on Desi programs with sufficient efforts and fundings can bring the dream into the reality. Tejas is but our first step.

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