India in n-sub club,Arihant to be inducted in next 2 yrs

Once inducted,the 6,000-tonne Arihant — the name means destroyer of enemies — would be the vital third leg of India’s nuclear policy that hinges around the “second strike” theory — which says that India will only use nuclear weapons as a retaliatory measure against a first strike by the enemy.

Re-stating the doctrine,the Prime Minister tried to assuage fears of neighbouring countries by saying that the submarine was not aimed at threatening anyone. “We do not have any aggressive designs nor do we seek to threaten anyone. We seek an external environment in our region and beyond that is conducive to our peaceful development and the protection of our value systems,” he said at the launch ceremony that was carried out in the dry dock of the Ship Building Centre (SBC) where the submarine has been under construction since 1998.

This is the first time that the Prime Minister has spoken on the project,which has been top secret since the late 1970s when it was cleared by Indira Gandhi. In fact,while funding to the tune of Rs 30,000 crore is said to have gone into the project,successive governments have refused to even acknowledge its existence.

For the first time,the dimensions of the submarine have been made public. The project director,Vice Admiral (retd) D S P Verma,said that the Arihant is a 6,000-tonne submarine with a length of 110 metres and a breadth of 11 metres. Experts say the vessel will be able to carry 12 K 15 submarine launched ballistic missiles that have a range of over 700 km.

What makes a nuclear powered submarine even more important in India’s context is its commitment to never use a nuclear weapon unless it is attacked first. This requires the need of a credible under-sea second strike capability in case the first strike wipes out missile bases and air-based assets.

“Our voluntary commitment to ‘no first use’ nuclear weapon policy also necessitated acquiring a credible second strike capability to safeguard our national interests,” said Defence Minister A K Antony.

Significantly,all three dignitaries who spoke at the function — the PM,Defence Minister and Navy Chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta — made special mention of the Russian “cooperation” received in the project.

While it is an open secret that Russia helped in the design of the submarine and miniaturisation of the reactor,this is the first time that its help has been openly acknowledged. The entire Russian design team and the Russian Ambassador to India,V I Trubnikov,were present at the function.

Interestingly,the size of the Arihant is similar to the first nuclear submarine in the world that was launched four decades ago by the US. Besides the US,which has 74 nuclear submarines,Russia (44),UK (13),France (10) and China (10) also possess nuclear-powered submarines. The last nation to enter the nuclear submarine club was China when it launched its Han class submarines in the early 1980s.

China has started mass producing its second generation of nuclear submarines. India has a lot of catching up to do as the new “Shang” and “Jin” class submarines — details of which emerged earlier last year — are a big leap ahead of their older and noisier Hans class submarines.

However,before India gets its own nuclear submarine fleet,the Navy will train its personnel on a Russian Akula class nuclear submarine that India is getting on a 10-year lease towards the end of this year.