Bengaluru: Following controversy, the Lord Hanuman’s sticker that was seen on the HAL’s supersonic trainer aircraft — HLFT-42 –during the Aero India 2023 was removed.

We had put Lord Hanuman’s picture just to depict the power of the aircraft

The scale model of the HLFT-42 (Hindustan Lead Fighter Trainer) aircraft was unveiled by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited during the inaugural ceremony of the five-day air show in Bengaluru on Monday. The sticker of Lord Hanuman was pasted on the tail of the next-generation aircraft with a message “storm is coming” written next to it. The Bengaluru-based company has now taken off the image from the aircraft.

“We had put Lord Hanuman’s picture just to depict the power of the aircraft, but after an internal discussion, we decided not to have it so we removed it. It was a simple thing and was based on the previous trainer aircraft ‘Marut’ but we saw some interpretations. The project is still in the initial stage and we only wanted to focus on the project,” the Chief Managing Director of HAL said.

It may be mentioned here that the HLFT-42 is the ‘Next Gen Supersonic Trainer’ that will play a “critical role” in modern combat aircraft training with state-of-the-art avionics like Active Electronically Scanned Array, Electronic Warfare Suite, Infrared Search and Track with Fly by Wire control system, according to the HAL.