Indigenously-built 'INS Kavaratti' to be commissioned into Indian Navy at Vizag

The last of the four indigenously built Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) stealth corvette ‘INS Kavaratti’ under the Project 28 is set to be commissioned into the Indian Navy by Army Chief General MM Naravane, at the Naval Dockyard in Visakhapatnam on Thursday.

Kavaratti is designed by the Indian Navy’s in-house organisation Directorate of Naval Design (DND) and built by Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers (GRSE) in Kolkata. The initiative depicts India's growing capability in becoming self-reliant, in tune with the objective of ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat’. The warship has up to 90% indigenously built content and the use of carbon composite for the superstructure is a remarkable feat achieved in Indian shipbuilding, the Defence Ministry said in a statement.

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Kavaratti has modern weapons and sensor suite which can detect and destroy submarines. In addition to this, the ship has a reliable self-defence capability and good endurance for long-range deployments. The ship will be commissioned into the Indian Navy as a combat-ready platform as it has completed the sea trials of all the systems onboard. Kavaratti takes her name from the former INS Kavaratti, an Arnala class missile corvette which played a key role during the 1971 war.

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Becoming self-reliant

The government has unveiled a number of policy initiatives in the last few months with an aim to boost domestic defence production. On August 9, the defence minister announced that India will stop the import of 101 weapons and military platforms like transport aircraft, light combat helicopters, conventional submarines, cruise missiles and sonar systems by 2024.

In a related development, the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) identified 108 military systems and subsystems like navigation radars, tank transporters and missile canisters for the domestic industry to design, develop and manufacture. 

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