A team of senior officials from the Indian Air Force and the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) is visiting Russia to discuss and negotiate issues pertaining to the futuristic fifth generation fighter aircraft that the two countries are planning to jointly design, develop and eventually produce.

Led by the Air Force's Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Plans) Air Vice Marshal N.V. Tyagi, the team, which also has among its members an official from HAL's Aircraft Research and Development Centre, Bangalore and another from HAL's Aircraft Upgrades Research and Development Centre, Nashik, will leave for Moscow on Monday.

Under an intergovernmental agreement inked during last October' s session of the Indo-Russian Intergovernmental Commission on Military-Technical Cooperation in Moscow, the two countries will jointly design, develop, and manufacture the fifth generation multi-role jet fighter.

Already under design by Russia's Sukhoi aircraft company (the prototype is scheduled to fly in 2009), work on the fifth generation aircraft is to be modeled on the lines of the successful BrahMos missile joint venture between the two countries.

The funding, engineering and intellectual property is to be shared by the two sides in an equal measure. The fighter will be inducted into the air forces of both countries, besides being exported to third countries.

Issues pertaining to the preparation of a preliminary project report on the project, details of the work that has already been carried out by the Russian side, the eventual work share between the two sides, the work that Indian companies, especially HAL, should undertake, and costs are expected to be discussed during the meetings.

While the Russian version will have a Russian engine, the Indian version could have a western engine. The aircraft is likely to be operational around 2015.

Both India and Russia are pining hopes on the fifth generation aircraft giving a new fillip to ties between the two countries. During the signing of the agreement, Defense Minister A.K. Antony had remarked that it marked "the start of cooperation in the development of state-of-the-art new-technology weapon systems."