00:00I am grateful for the invaluable opportunity to fly on the Tejas.
00:06As an aircraft born from indigenous defense capabilities,
00:12Tejas stands as a symbol of India's strategic and global partnership.
00:19As the strategic environment surrounding our countries
00:24becomes increasingly complex,
00:27the importance of closer defense cooperation continues to grow.
00:37This shared understanding was also reaffirmed at the Japan India Summit meeting
00:44between Prime Minister Takaichi and Prime Minister Modi in July.
00:50As well as the Japan India Defense Minister meeting
00:54between Minister Koizumi and Minister Singh in August,
00:59both of which were held in India.
01:04Building on this strong support and commitment at the political level,
01:09Japan and India are advancing practical cooperation in ways
01:16to contribute to the peace, stability and prosperity of the Indo-Pacific region.
01:25Dear Guardian 26 is a tangible example of these efforts.
01:32It demonstrates how our cooperation has evolved from exchanges to practical cooperation.
01:43Future respect, professional trust and shared commitment to peace and stability.
01:49India and Japan share a vision of a free, open and rule-based Indo-Pacific as you had said.
01:56The stronger cooperation between our air forces contributes to that shared objective of our conflict.
02:04Both our countries start.
02:07We have already heard that how the relationship between the two air forces has grown over a period of time,
02:16from Shiniu Maitri to Virgajian,
02:19and from just having some subject matter expert exchanges to having an exercise at the tactical level.
02:27I think that too in a very complex environment.
02:31This exercise reflects a very high degree of trust and confidence that the two air forces have in each other.
02:39In this heat you are flying.
02:41But I can assure you that the Indian aircraft industry, the R&D as well as production,
02:48is growing at a very fast pace.
02:50We have been able to operationalize this aircraft and a large number of these are on orders.
02:57Some of these are stuck because of some global supply chain issues.
03:05But with the next version of Tejas, that is Tejas Mark II,
03:09and next 5th gen aircraft that we are making, that is advanced medium combat aircraft,
03:15Indian aviation, I will say, defense aviation industry and R&D is now set to hit much higher heights.
03:27And the sortie that you have flown, I think that is a very clear example of how much faith and
03:35trust you have in the home grown Indian aircraft.
03:39You flew with the group Captain Samraat, one of our finest pilots that we have is commanding Tejas unit.
03:46And I am sure this sortie will go in a long way in our having exchange programs and even flight
03:52training.
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