SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

With a focus on reducing Indian dependency on Russian hardware, Pentagon has been pushing the Biden administration to elevate the Indian position to levels as same to close allies like Israel and Japan in terms of access to US-made Military hardware as per the latest media reports.

The US in February surprised Indian military planners when it brought Two F-35A to India at the Aero India 2023 Airshow indirectly making a pitch for the sale of 5th Gen fighter jet even though India had not expressed interest in the program.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

India has issued Notices to Airmen (NOTAM) for a launch of a missile around the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, near the Malacca Strait for the period from 25-28 April 2023 as per information provided by Twitter user Damien Symon@detresfa_.

The designated area for the NOTAM is just 465km in length which indicates it might be a test of a ship-based cruise missile like Brahmos Extended Range.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

General Said Chanegriha, Chief of Staff of Algerian People’s National Army was briefed about the Indian-developed Astra Mk1 Beyond Visual Range Air to Air (BVRAAMs) missile at the LAAD 2023, Military exhibition that is being held at Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.

Astra Mk1 BVRAAMs which are equivalent to American AIM-120C5 Beyond Visual Range Air to Air Missile (BVRAAM) with a head-on range of 110km have started replacing Russian Vympel NPO R-77 missiles from India’s Sukhoi-30MKI fleet.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Indian Armed Forces after a discussion on their requirements have submitted a report that MQ-9B Predator high altitude long endurance (HALE) armed drones to be procured from General Atomics will be 18 units with each service getting 6 units each that have come down from the initial assessment of 10 units per service branch in total for 30 units.

MQ-9B Predator which will cost India a whopping $100 million per unit has seen resistance from Indian Army and Air Force due to cost while Indian Navy was firm to induct 10 units into its service and was heading the intra-service negotiations.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Atul Dinkar Rane, CEO and MD BrahMos Aerospace Private Limited has said that the company is planning to test a 1.5-ton BrahMos-NG Supersonic cruise missile with a range of 290km by end of 2024 or early 2025 with a missile entering production later in 2025.

BrahMos-NG, Air Launched Weapon System already has caught the attention of many Airforce and many Su-30 operators like Vietnam and Indonesia, Malaysia is closely watching this program since adapting and integrating BrahMos-NG into their Su-30 fleet won’t require extensive hardening of the mid-fuselage and other modification as required for the BrahMos-A ALCM.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

While India is considering a German proposal for Government to Government (G2G) deal for the supply of Next-generation Diesel-Electric submarines to India while it scouts for International vendors for its Project-75I (India) tender, it is estimated that the overall cost of the project will be around $8 billion sharp rise from the Six Scorpène submarines are being built under Project-75 by the MDL under technology transfer from the Naval Group of France under a $3.75 billion.

idrw.org has learned that German offers for Six-next generation submarines as expected won’t come cheap but price escalations from the 2005 deal for Six Scorpène submarines will put them at nearly double the cost which too was locally manufactured in the country.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

While attending the LAAD 2023, an international exhibition and conference for Latin American defence and security held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, India offered its BrahMos Supersonic cruise missile to the Brazilian military.

For some time now, India has had a strong interest in the Latin American market to increase its weapon exports to the region, and it has marketed this product in the region.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Russia’s space agency said on Monday that it was in talks with India about supplying RD-191 rocket engines. Roscomos is looking to India as a new market because it is no longer able to export rocket engines to the United States.

The RD-191 kerosene/liquid oxygen engines are used in Russia’s Angara rocket boosters. The RD-181 engine is currently used to power the first stage of Northrop Grumman’s Antares launch vehicle which after the Ukraine war sanctions has meant export to the United States has collapsed.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Bengaluru’s Raman Research Institute (RRI) will work with the Indian Navy’s combat systems engineering wing to develop secure communication channels of strategic importance using quantum technologies.

RRI announced last week a ground-breaking demonstration of secure communication between a stationary source and a moving receiver using quantum key distribution. Although the Indian Navy intends to use it for ship-to-shore communication in the first phase, quantum communications would provide secure communications for Indian missile submarines, raising the possibility that it could be used to communicate with nuclear-armed submarines.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

According to a report in the ” The Hindu”, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India has flagged Three Defence PSUs selling Ordinance Factor, Trichy, Small Arms Rifle, Kanpur, and Rifle Factory Ishapore that from 2015 have been selling Indian Made Assualt Rifles to BSF, CRPF, ITBP and CISF over the cost of its production they’re by incurring a loss of ?366 crores over five years from 2015.

Three Defence PSUs have sold 12 different categories of guns and Assault rifles to Central Paramilitary forces at a loss because they failed to reduce their procurement cost of the raw material that is used to manufacture them in the country.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

The Ministry of Defence, Government of India, intends to procure Quantity 439 (Indian Army-415 and Indian Air Force-24) Light Vehicles (Electric) along with 35 x Fast Chargers (Indian Army-29 & Indian Air Force-06) under the ‘Buy (Indian-IDDM)’ category with minimum 50% Indigenous content and seeks participation in the procurement process from prospective Bidders.

Light Vehicles (Electric) should be able to achieve speeds up to 120kmph and can carry a payload of 900kg with a range of 400km that comes with a Battery pack & Motor life of Not less than 8 years/ 1,60,000 km.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

The Indian Air Force (IAF) is looking to purchase 60-80 Medium Transport Aircraft (MTA) to be used as Medium Haul Transporters, for which it has already solicited bids from international aerospace companies that might agree to jointly manufacture them in the country under Transfer of Technology (ToT).

idrw.org has learned that whichever is selected will be used as a platform for the development of flight refuelling aircraft (FRA) and airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) as it plans to have more indigenous platforms to beef up its requirements as Chinese PLAAF expands its fleet of Force Multipliers.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Indian Navy inducted MiG-29K supersonic air dominance fighters in 2010 but will get rid of the entire fleet of around 41 jets from service by 2025 onwards with less than 25 years of service in the fleet due to severe built quality issues with the jets that often requires periodic inspections at regular small intervals.

MiG-29K came with a 25-year design life of 6,000 hours and with a life extension programme it could have served Indian Navy for another 10-15 years but idrw.org has learned that the Navy has no such plans to enhance the service span for the fleet and instead entire fleet will be scrapped after retirement.

SOURCE: RAUNAK KUNDE / NEWS BEAT / IDRW.ORG.

Due to the banking system’s inability to clear payments for new equipment, the Indian Armed Forces have already hinted at low procurement plans for Russian-developed equipment for this fiscal year.

Economic sanctions imposed by the West on Russia’s banking system have resulted in payment gateways being blocked and the procurement of new equipment becoming more difficult. As a result, India is considering indigenizing Russian equipment and procuring Russian technology to advance its programme instead.