NEW DELHI (PTI): Squadron Leader Mohana Singh has become India's first woman pilot to be part of a Tejas fighter squadron of the Indian Air Force (IAF), officials said on Wednesday.

Singh was among the first three women fighter pilots commissioned into the IAF in June 2016.

She has been assigned the No 18 'Flying Bullets' Squadron, the officials said.

The squadron is based in Gujarat's Naliya.

Singh had participated in the recently concluded Tarang Shakti multilateral air combat exercise.

She was earlier part of the No 3 fighter squadron which is based at Nal in Rajasthan.

Singh was flying MiG-21 Bison as part of the No 3 squadron.

Avani Chaturvedi, Bhawana Kanth and Singh comprised the first batch of women fighter pilots of the IAF.

They were commissioned into the IAF in 2016, less than a year after the government decided to open the fighter stream for women on an experimental basis.

In February 2018, Chaturvedi became the first Indian woman to fly a fighter aircraft solo when she flew a MiG-21 bison. She undertook the sortie from the IAF's Jamnagar base.

In 2022, the defence ministry said it had decided to convert the experimental scheme for the induction of women fighter pilots in the IAF into a permanent one.