NEW DELHI: Even as India's long-delayed P-75(I) project for six new-generation submarines continues to hang fire, Pakistan on Sunday announced that its newly inducted Chinese-built AIP submarine had successfully test-fired an anti-ship cruise missile in the North Arabian Sea.
The Pakistani military's media wing ISPR said PNS/M Hangor "accurately engaged" a long-range target during the firing, witnessed by Pakistan Navy chief Admiral Naveed Ashraf. It did not identify the missile, specify its range or say when the test was conducted.
Sources in the Indian defence establishment, however, said the missile was the Chinese YJ-18, assessed to be derived from the Russian Klub family, with a claimed strike range of up to 540 km in some variants.
The test comes just 12 days after a Pakistani naval vessel and an Indian warship collided in the North Arabian Sea on September 15. India had lodged a strong protest, holding that PNS Hunain approached the Indian warship at high speed and manoeuvred in an unsafe manner. Islamabad had disputed the Indian account. The Indian warship continued with its mission, while PNS Hunain had to return to port.
The real concern for the Indian Navy, however, is the platform itself.
Hangor, the first of eight submarines Pakistan is acquiring from China, was commissioned at Sanya in China at the end of April and arrived in Karachi in June. Four of the eight are being built in China and four in Karachi.
Crucially, the submarine is fitted with AIP. Conventional diesel-electric submarines have to surface or snorkel every few days to run their diesel engines and recharge their batteries, which exposes them to detection. AIP allows them to stay submerged for up to two to three weeks at a stretch, making them far stealthier and harder to hunt.
With a surface fleet that is only a fraction of India's, Pakistan has long relied on submarines as its main asymmetric weapon to challenge Indian naval dominance in the Arabian Sea. The eight new AIP boats will give it a much larger and stealthier underwater arm.
Meanwhile, India does not have a single operational AIP-equipped submarine as of now.
"China is steadily building up Pakistan's underwater combat capabilities, from submarines to missiles. We have to be fully prepared for that, even as we keep a close watch on the growing Chinese naval presence in the Indian Ocean," said the source.
The Navy's six French-origin Kalvari-class submarines are diesel-electric boats. The rest of its conventional fleet, the Russian-origin Sindhughosh and German-origin Shishumar class submarines, is ageing and fast approaching the end of its service life. The indigenous AIP system developed by DRDO, which missed the refit schedule of INS Kalvari, is now slated for integration on INS Khanderi. That, however, will cover just one submarine.
The bigger fix, Project-75 (India), for six AIP-equipped submarines to be built by Mazagon Dock with German firm TKMS at a cost of over Rs 70,000 crore, has been cleared by the finance ministry but still awaits the final nod from the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS). Even after the contract is inked, the first submarine will be delivered only seven years later.
By then, most of the Navy's existing conventional submarines will be over 40 years old.
Nonetheless, India does hold a clear strategic edge with its nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, INS Arihant, INS Arighaat and INS Aridaman, which Pakistan does not possess.
