While trawling the net I came across a goanet post of Dec 6, 2005 (that is over two years ago) in which some information was provided about the acquisitions of the trainer version of Sea Harriers which have been in the news of late. <In 1983-1984, India obtained a batch of six Sea Harrier Mark 51s, apart from two tandem-seat "T.60s" for use off their carrier INS Vikrant. Ten more Mark 51s and a T.60 were ordered in 1985 and delivered in 1989-1991, with another batch of seven Mark 51s and a fourth T.60 ordered and delivered after that, for a total of 23 Mark 51s and four T.60s. Two more T.60s, which were modified from RAF surplus T.4s, were obtained in the 1990s as attrition replacements.>
According to this, a total of six T.60s were requisitioned of which 2 were designated as "attrition replacements" (indicating perhaps that at least two had crashed up to that point in time which is however not specified). Currently, the news reports talk of only a total of 5 trainer aircraft leaving a discrepancy of -1 (may be a crash in the intervening period). The figure net of crashes is placed at 3. This is also half the total pretty much like the number of operational fighters (single seaters) remaining (latter may be a bit less than half). Anybody like to comment or confirm? Cheers.
