NEW DELHI: India’s indigenous manufacturing of conventional submarines has reached the final leg with the last of the six Scorpene class submarines being manufactured as part of Project 75 (P-75) sliding into the waters on Wednesday. A decision on the next six advanced indigenous submarines is awaited.
The Indian Navy in a statement said, “The sixth and last submarine of the Indian Navy’s Kalvari class submarines of Project 75 has been launched today at the Kanhoji Angre Wet Basin of Mazagon Dock Limited (MDL).” It’s being manufactured jointly with the Naval Group, France.
Dr Ajay Kumar, Defence Secretary, was the chief guest at the ceremony and the submarine named ‘Vagsheer’ was launched by Mrs Veena Ajay Kumar, in keeping with naval traditions of launch/naming by a lady.
The sixth submarine will now commence setting to work on various equipment and harbour trials. The crew will thereafter sail the submarine for the rigorous sea acceptance trials after which it would be delivered to the Indian Navy by late next year.
These six submarines will add to the Navy’s underwater capability as most of the 15 conventional submarines with India are more than 25 years old. Also, Pakistan and China have been adding strength to their underwater capabilities.
But, the decision on Project 75 (India) is getting delayed and even if it gets the go-ahead it might take another two years to begin, says defence analyst Commodore Anil Jai Singh.
Project-75(I) envisages indigenous construction of six modern conventional submarines with contemporary equipment, weapons and sensors including AIP (Air Independent Propulsion), advanced torpedoes, modern missiles and state of the art countermeasure systems.
This would provide a major boost to the indigenous design and construction capability of submarines in India, in addition to bringing in the latest submarine design and technologies as part of the project.
“While P-75 is reaching the end of its cycle the contract for the next six should have been signed as it would lead to a gap of a few years again till the next set of submarine construction will start,” says Commodore Singh, a former submariner.
The contract for P-75 was signed in 2005. Earlier, in 1994 India manufactured two German submarines but the gap of 11 years led to loss of this specialised skill.
The first of the P-75 submarines was inducted into the Navy in December 2017.