India and Russia to co-develop new generation infantry fighting vehicle?

[Zarvan]

Indian army infantry vehicles, BMP-2 Sarath move into a formation during war exercises.Wiki Commons/Fred W. Baker III

India might team up with its longstanding friend Russia in a bid to modernise the Indian Army, as it plans to co-develop a new generation infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) with the Russians.

The co-development might, if all goes well, happen with an Indian enterprise said Albert Bakov, vice president and co-owner of the Tractor Plants Concern, reported TASS, the Russian news agency.

"There are plans of joint production of a new combat vehicle implying development and manufacture at their plant of a Russo-Indian infantry fighting vehicle. This is quite realistic, but no final decision on this has been made so far," Bakov was quoted as saying.

Recently, during the Russia Arms Expo 2015 in mid September, India signed a contract with Uralvagonzavod, the Russian defence enterprise to deliver spare parts for the T-72 tanks and the contract will be for two years. India has around 1,900 T-72 tanks, which have been upgraded subsequently since it first bought it in 1981. The deal is worth millions of dollars, TASS reported.

Apart from this, India is also negotiating a new contract with Russia to supply it with the modern T-90MS.

The T-90MS uses similar ammunition as T-90 tanks, sporting 1130HP engine, a PNM Sosna-U gunner view, a 7.62 mm turret UDP T05BV-1 RWS, inertial navigation systems and new explosive reactive armour (ERA).

These deals will boost the ongoing Indo-Russian strategic co-operation to a newer level, ahead of Indian PM Narendra Modi's Moscow visit in December 2015 to attend the bilateral Annual Summit.


Article Published: October 1, 2015 08:28 IST

India and Russia to co-develop new generation infantry fighting vehicle?