The LCA delays had many reasons and many are genuine ones.
It had a bad start and an equally bad governance and vision associated with it from the beginning. It also lost focus when IJT had development took a lot of technical staff along with it.
The ambition or say over ambitious will and time spend to develop the difficult Multi Mode Radar (MMR) and to develop a complex jet engine led to delays. Even today Tejas flies on US engine and Israeli radar.
The disastrous managerial decision to give task to develop a
jet engine to GTRE ( gas turbine research establishment) and
radar development to HAL was a BIG blunder.They never had any experience doing such complex works.
The only organisation that could develop Radar was LRDE ( electronics and radar development establishment) and engine should have been given to HAL Engine division in banagalore, which had experience of developing engines.
Lack of adequate workforce was also an issue and it was split when IJT (intermediate jet) project was taken over by HAL.
But even the delays are justifiable.
European fighters took 25 years and F-22 was cold war project and took 2 decades.
Thee gains we got from this delay deals are promising too.
Development of technologies like composite materials, fly by wire , glass cockpits, avionics suits ,the knowledge base,and the technologies expertise we developed for LCA is used conduct full air craft vibration tests even for sukhoi and Mirages ( external stores). It decreased dependency on that part atleast.
Tejas is meant for short duration missions while heavier ones like Sukhoi's can fly for longer missions. And since its termed as an interceptor ( interceptor by definition says its meant to prevent enemy fighters like bombers and reconnaissance aircraft from gaining grounds) i expect these little birds to have more stealthy features . Was expecting a changed nose like in alenia aermacchi m-346 ..or even a change in intakes like the hornets change during MK-2 annoucement, but was disspointed at the change being only a few meters length.
But im optimistic it will change with immense expertise and technology that will bring with association with foreign vendors.
Already avionics is speculated as the best for LCA, the rest will catch up and im sure when its time comes it can be easily compared on par or even better than Gripens.
Btwn pic of AA