Indian army wants more tanks

India’s main battle tanks had one been relatively advanced by world standards, but long delays in fielding the indigenous “Arjun” MBT, combined with a successful Pakistani/Ukrainian program for its T-80UD “Al-Khalid” tanks, eroded India’s local advantage. The poor performance of T-72s in combat against modern main battle tanks could not have been comforting, either. In early October 2006, India Defence and Indian papers reported that the Indian Army intended to produce nearly 1,000 T90S ‘Bhishma’ main battle tanks in India by 2020. These would be bought in addition to the 310 T90 MBTs already under contract from Russia. Later that month, news reports noted a follow-on contract for another 330 T-90S tank kits from Russia that would assembled in India. Taken together those 2 firm production agreements reportedly exceed $1 billion.
The modernized T-72 now known as the T-90 has reportedly encountered serious problems in Indian service, from issues with its Thales thermal imaging systems, to difficulties in hot weather, to low readiness rates. Meanwhile, negotiations with Russia over technology transfer issues had shelved the 1,000 tank indigenous production goal, leaving only the 2 firm production agreements. The Arjun project has continued to fade, however, with the Indian Army announcing in July 2008 that production would be capped at just 124 tanks. As the final act in the battle for the core of India’s future tank force, recent reports indicate that the Russians have removed their technology transfer roadblocks, clearing the way for fully indigenous T-90S production in India…

• The T-90 in India: Directions and Delays
• Updates and Key Events

The T-90 in India: Directions and Delays

Arjun tank

As of December 2006, the 310 T-90S tanks imported from Russia under a February 2001 Rs 3,625 crore (about $795 million) contract are divided between the first lot of 124 T-90S tanks bought off-the-shelf, and 186 imported in knocked-down condition for assembly at the Heavy Vehicles Factory at Avadi.
The goal was to begin progressive manufacture of the follow-on batch of 1,000 from 2007-2008 onward, working under the license production agreement associated with India’s 2001 order. The idea was to build upon and broaden India’s indigenous capabilities as the process moved forward.
The purchase of 330 more ready-for-assembly T-90 kits later in October 2006 would appear to be a deviation from this strategy, but as of August 2008, production of the fully localized Indian tanks has not even begun yet at the Avadi Heavy Vehicles Factory. Jane’s believed that the order for the 330 sets of T-90S components was driven by chronic delays in the production schedule of the domestic Arjun MBT, and multi-year delays in T-72 modernization due to bureaucratic vacillation. This turned out to be partly correct; as DID has reported before, those are chronic problems in India’s defense market. It seems that there was also a problem with full Russian technology transfer, however, which held up production at Avadi.

T-80UD “Al-Khalid”

Confirmation of the T-90’s status as India’s future tank has also faced operational difficulties, including the in-service difficulties noted by an October 2007 MosNews’ report. These include repeated heat-related malfunctions of the fire-control system’s key Thales Catherine thermal imaging (TI) camera, lack of cooling systems leading to uninhabitable temperatures over 60C degrees (over 140F) inside the tank, and reports that at least one armored regiment had an in-service rate of just 25% for its T-90s.
The T-72s’ “Project Rhino” may eventually get started as well under the Army’s 2020 plans, adding reactive armor, electronics, sights, et. al. in collaboration with Israel, Poland and Russia. Persistent reports that many Indian T-72s lack effective IR-imagine equipment would appear to make such upgrades a priority item, but as Bharat-Rakshak notes, progress has been very slow.