Article Posted on : - Dec 03, 2009

The warships of Indian Navy.

NEW DELHI (PTI): Indian Navy is all set to increase its fleet strength by another 40 warships within the next decade, taking its existing 130-warship fleet to a 170-warship fleet.

It will also improve its aviation wing strength by inducting 60 more aircraft and another 60 helicopters during the same period.

Navy chief Admiral Nirmal Verma Wednesday told an annual press conference just ahead of Navy Day on December 4 that these new inductions would be done as per its Maritime Capability Perspective Plan till 2017.

“The Navy has placed orders for 34 ships with Indian shipyards and another six ships with foreign shipyards. Among those to be inducted include Destroyers, Frigates, Fast Attack Craft, Fast Interceptor Boats, Survey Vessels, submarines and Fleet Tankers,” he added.

Upset over delays in warship delivery at Indian defence shipyards, Verma said there was a need to “revisit” the shipbuilding strategies and warned that the Navy would be forced to go in for imports if the domestic shipyards were unable to meet the demands of the Navy.

The present rate of delivery of warships from the three defence public sector shipyards was one ship a year.

The Navy has ordered ships with foreign shipyards in the case of 'Talwar' class frigates – being built in Russia, the 'Gorshkov' aircraft carrier also from Russia and two Fleet Tankers being built in Italy.

Among those to be inducted are seven Delhi-class destroyers, three Shivalik-class frigates, six Scorpene submarines, an indigenous aircraft carrier, six survey vessels, four anti-submarine corvettes, four offshore patrol vessels (OPVs), six fast attack craft and a training ship.

The future projects for which approval is being sought from the Government are five follow-on OPVs and mine clearance vessels, apart from 80 fast interceptor boats for the newly raised 1,000-man 'Sagar Prahari Bal' post 26/11 terror attacks, the Navy chief said.