Pak’s F-16 was shot down, says IAF; refutes US report

NEW DELHI: The Indian Air Force on Friday asserted that it had shot down an F-16 aircraft of the Pakistan Air Force on February 27 during aerial combat. “During the aerial engagement, one MiG 21 Bison of the IAF shot down an F-16 in Nowshera sector,” the IAF said in a statement.

File photo of an F-16 aircraft. Reuters

Ajay Banerjee
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, April 5

Reacting to claims from a US based news magazine, the Indian Air Force (IAF) on Friday evening said “during the engagement (the air-duel on Feb 27) a MiG-21 Bison of the IAF shot down one F-16 in the Nowshera sector”.

US magazine ‘Foreign Policy’ had said a count of the F-16s with Pakistan has found that none of them are "missing" and all the fighter planes were "present and accounted for". The finding by the US on the ground in Pakistan "directly contradicted" India's claim that its air force shot down an F-16 fighter jet during an aerial dogfight on February 27.

Read: US findings ‘contradict’ India's claim that it shot down Pak’s jet on Feb 27

Responding to this, the IAF in a statement on Friday said: “There were two separate ejections (of pilots): one was the IAF MiG 21 Bison and the other a Pakistan Air Force aircraft. Electronic signatures gathered by us indicate that the PAF aircraft was an F-16”. The downed IAF plane was piloted by Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman, who had ejected over Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK) and was returned to India on March 1.

The IAF on February 28 displayed pieces of the AMRAAM missile, fired by a Pakistani F-16, as evidence to "conclusively" prove that Pakistan deployed US-manufactured F-16 fighter jets during an aerial raid targeting Indian military installations in Kashmir.

On April 1, the Director General of Pakistan’s Inter-Service Public Relations (ISPR) in a statement issued tonight said: “No Pakistani F16 was hit by IAF”. It had for the first time Pakistan admitted that the F-16 was used saying: “India can assume any type of their choice, even F-16. Pakistan retains the right to use anything and everything in its legitimate self-defence”.

According to the ‘Foreign Policy’ magazine, Pakistan invited the United States to physically count its F-16 planes after the incident as part of an end-user agreement signed when the foreign military sale was finalised.