Kolkata, December 23, 2005 (Express News Service)

THE American F-16s will be back at Kalaikunda Air Force base in West Midnapore district, about 200 km from Kolkata, for the second time in less than two months. It’s time for yet another joint air exercise, this time between India and Singapore.

The Singapore Air Force will be bringing in eight F-16s and 130 personnel for the exercise at Kalaikunda. The exercise, to begin from January 3, will continue for 18 days, according to Wg Cdr R K Das, the official spokesman for the Ministry of Defence in Kolkata.

A similar exercise between India and the United States Air Force (USAF) at Kalaikunda in November had triggered a massive protest rally from the CPI(M) and other Left parties. Nearly 60,000 people had assembled outside the air base to lodge their protest against such joint military exercise with US forces.

The Left leaders had then complaiend that the Centre was compromising India’s sovereignity and security concerns. Their cadres also burnt effigies of American President George Bush.

Like the Indo-US exercise, the Indo-Singapore air exercise is also going to be an elaborate one. A similar exercise between the two forces was held in Gwalior, this one is the second in the series. In 2004, the IAF had deployed the Surya Kiran formation aerobatic team and the helicopter display team, Sarang, at Singapore during their annual air show.

The defence officials said that such exercises are aimed at ‘‘fostering and developing’’ better relations with friendly foreign countries through fruitful interaction in operational, technical and administrative practices’’.

The Indian Air Force has already increased the level of cooperation with Air Forces of friendly countries like USA, France, South Africa, UK, China and Russia, the officials claimed.

The infrastructure at the Air Force station at Kalaikunda has been upgraded to host such bilateral exercies with foreign Air Forces, the defence official said. Singapore has a versatile Air Force and operates modern aircraft and weapon system, it was stated.