From an IAF personnel who trained on M88:
Doc, my younger brother too had some uncharitable views on Tejas earlier however post his new posting in Squadron 17, and spending time on M88, he has mellowed down.
His latest view is that Mk1A is as good as Rafale in terms of handling.. will be a very potent beast by Mk2
He says Tejas has better and more responsive engine, better TWR and also control laws are no slouch. His opinion is that IAF simply latched on Navy's demand of higher thrust otherwise current engine is more than enough.
Only few Aerodynamic chinks (due to short frame).
TWR may or may not be better, depending on what config we are talking about.
No surprises F404 is better, but its working better on LCA would indicate the intakes are not creating any bottleneck, bursting myth that LCA intakes are smaller than req and dont allow full thrust.
He has trained on M88 for more than a year in france