Kangra Superintendent of Police (SP) Santosh Patial said that he and other officials were on their way to the spot. The fighter jet crashed in Mehra Palli village under the Jawali police station

Shimla: A MiG-21 fighter jet crashed in a village in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh on Wednesday, killing the pilot.

The fighter jet crashed in Mehra Palli village under the Jawali police station, Kangra Superintendent of Police (SP) Santosh Patial said. The SP told PTI that he and other officials were on their way to the spot.

The aircraft had taken off from the Pathankot air base in Punjab, officials said. The aircraft was on a routine sortie. A court of inquiry has been ordered in the case. 

This is the second Indian Air Force fighter jet crash in two months. In June, an Indian Air Force Jaguar fighter-bomber crashed in Gujarat's Kutch soon after take-off in June, killing the pilot, a senior Air Commodore.

Earlier in January, an MiG-29K combat aircraft of the Indian Navy caught fire after it veered off the runway at Goa airport. The trainee pilot managed to eject safely from the aircraft, which crashed inside INS Hansa base while it was trying to take off.

Four years ago, five crew members of a C-130J Super Hercules Special Operations transport aircraft were killed after the plane crashed during tactical training mission.

In the same year, a Jaguar combat jet crashed near Bholasar village in Rajasthan's Bikaner district. However, the pilot and co-pilot ejected safely. According to the defence ministry, the pilots detected a technical problem while landing at Nal airport in Bikaner and ejected.