India's air force will allow female fighter pilots by 2017

Indian Air Force C-17 and fighter jets
(Image credit: Chandan Khanna/AFP/Getty Images)

Women will be able to train and enter the Indian Air Force as fighter pilots, the defense ministry said Saturday. It's the first time India's armed forces will allow women to serve in combat roles, The Huffington Post reports.

"This progressive step is in keeping with the aspirations of Indian women and is in line with contemporary trends in armed forces of developed nations," the government statement read, adding that women's skills were found to be on par with men's.

Female pilots are expected to begin training in India in 2016 and entering combat in 2017. India joins countries including the U.S., France, and Israel in permitting female fighter pilots, The Associated Press reports.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Continue reading for free

We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.

Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.

Julie Kliegman

Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.