Which implies the only reason the SH and Rafele were not picked was because the Mig 29ks cakes as part of the deal and nothing to do with the weight implications. I'm sorry if this sounds petty but I think you should either stick to your conviction or admit you were wrong and not pretend you were saying what you were not and agree with me.
You get it wrong, because I agreed with you on the restictions of weight and size of the fighters, but also told you that that doesn't mean they neccesarily needs catapults. If the carrier is big enough and can handle heavier fighters you can do it with out, see the Russian carrier Admiral Kuznetsov.
As I said, IN was interested in western fighters for the Gorshkov and made studies if it would be possible to operate them. The issue of the F18SH in this case, would have been the high weight and thrust mainly, because of the ski-jump take off and the short size of the Gorshkov deck.
However, the Russians left us with no choice here, because they combined the carrier deal with the procurement of 16 x Migs. So even if the F18, or Rafale would be useful, we couldn't get them for this carrier and the later order for more, was a logical step in regard to commonality between Gorshkov and IAC1, as well as their fighters.
Here is one of the articles that talked about INs interest:
India eyes US F-18 fighters for Russian-built Admiral Gorshkov
Moscow, May 22 (UNI) The Indian Navy has asked the US aircraft manufacturer Boeing for the use of its F-18 Super Hornet supersonic carrier-based fighter aircraft on board its Russian-built heavy aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov to be renamed INS Vikramaditya, Russian daily Izvestia said today.
A Boeing spokesman confirmed that his company had received a request from India for use of the fighters on board the heavy aircraft carrier...
India eyes US F-18 fighters for Russian-built Admiral Gorshkov - Oneindia News
The Brazilian navy is considering new fighters for their CATOBAR carrier as well, but although the F18SH can be used with the catapult system, the weight and size is an issue again, because it is too heavy for the wirings, which would limit the take off weight dramatically and is too big for the elevators. So there are several things you have to look at when considering a carrier fighter, especially when they are for a carrier that already is build. For IAC2 the decision about the fighters is important as well, but we can build it around the specs of the fighters, which will be easier and leaves more options.
+ does anyone know if the "K" comes with/or are plans to induct the Litening Pod on them for precision a2g roles? If not what alternatives are IN looking at given this is a key aspect the IN wanted?
Not sure, because the Litening pod is used by IAF and IN could go for a different one (Damocles, which is also used by Su 30 MKM, or the new Russian pods). If we keep in mind the limited number of hardpoints of the Mig, the integrated system of the Mig 35 (OLS-K) could be interesting as well: