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Seeking to push Make in India in defence along with meeting its immediate requirements, the Indian Navy is pushing proposals to equip the Kalvari submarines with torpedoes through both the indigenous and the buy global routes.
The proposals in this regard are expected to be discussed at a high-level defence ministry meeting next week. Two of the Indian Navy's proposals include buying 48 heavy-weight torpedoes through a global tender and acquiring the Made in India Electrical Heavyweight Torpedo, which was developed by the Defense Research and Development Organization, defence sources told ANI. This would be the third time that the Indian Navy would be trying to buy these torpedoes through the buy global route, as the earlier two attempts failed due to different issues. The first tender was almost finalised with the Navy having decided to go ahead with the Italian torpedo but it had to be cancelled due to corruption allegations against the entire Italian group in the VVIP Chopper scam case. The Indian EHWT programme is also expected to be used to arm strategic submarines in the future. India had earlier projected requirements for around 98 of these torpedoes but given the progress made in the indigenous torpedo programme, the numbers planned for imports have been slashed by more than 50 per cent. India has six Kalvari-class submarines and is going to get three more shortly, as announcements have already been made by India and France in this regard. India is also planning to build more strategic submarines under its indigenous military capability development programme. (ANI)
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