Navy to approach govt for three AIP-equipped attack submarines
In the backdrop of the expansion of the Chinese Navy and its belligerence in the Indo-Pacific, India is looking to upgrade its submarine deterrence in synergy with its QUAD partners.
The Indian Navy is expected to approach Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) for acceptance of the necessity for three air independent propulsion (AIP) equipped diesel attack submarines to be built at Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) in collaboration with the French Naval Group.
Kalveri class submarine
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It is learnt that the contract to build three AIP submarines will be given to MDL based on specific requirements of the Indian Navy. MDL has already built six Kalveri class, based on the French Scorpene class, submarines for the Indian Navy with the sixth INS Vagsheer expected to be commissioned into the Navy before March 2024.
The AIP fitted into the three submarines will be developed by the Defence Research and Development Organization but tested and validated by the French Naval Group. The same AIP will then be retrofitted in the Kalveri class submarines when they come for mid-life overhaul at MDL.
In the backdrop of the AUKUS alliance involving US and UK nuclear-powered submarines patrolling the west coast of Australia and beyond as soon as 2027, India is looking to upgrade its submarine fleet with three nuclear-powered conventional weapon-armed submarines in collaboration with France on lines of the latest 4765-ton Barracuda class. As per the AUKUS deal, the US will sell three Virginia class submarines to Australia in the2030s with the option of buying two more, and parallelly design and develop AUKUS class submarines in collaboration with the British. The Virginia class submarine has displacement of over 10200 ton and is powered with a nuclear reactor using 97 per cent weapons-grade enriched uranium.
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While the decision to go for nuclear attack submarines may take procedural time, India is expected to get one nuclear attack submarine from Russia on lease as part of the past contract to replace the previously leased INS Chakra in 2025. This deal was signed much before the Ukraine war with India adhering to the payment routine.
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While the decision to go for nuclear attack submarines may take procedural time, India is expected to get one nuclear attack submarine from Russia on lease as part of the past contract to replace the previously leased INS Chakra in 2025. This deal was signed much before the Ukraine war with India adhering to the payment routine.
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India needs to upgrade its sea-based deterrence in the context of the rapidly expanding Chinese Navy with the present strength of eight Jin-class nuclear ballistic missile submarines and 12 Shang and Han class nuclear attack submarines. With the PLA Navy operating two aircraft carriers with the third Fujian on the verge of being launched, it is only a matter of time when Chinese carrier strike forces will start patrolling the Indo-Pacific and resort to gunboat diplomacy in the region.
Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.
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