New Delhi:
The Indian Navy's Russian-made guided missile frigate INS Tushil was commissioned into the force in the Russian coastal city of Kaliningrad on Monday.
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh, Chief of Army Staff Admiral Dinesh K Tripathi and several other senior Indian officials were present at the commissioning ceremony.
INS Tushil is expected to significantly strengthen the operational capability of the Indian Navy in the Indian Ocean, a region that has witnessed increasing attacks by the Chinese PLA Navy in recent years.
The warship was built in Russia as part of a deal worth more than $2.5 billion that New Delhi signed with Moscow in 2016 for four stealth frigates for the Indian Navy.
Under the deal, two ships would be built in Russia while the other two would be manufactured in India.
In his remarks at the ceremony, Mr Singh described the commissioning of the warship as a proud testament to India's growing maritime strength and an important milestone in its long-standing ties with Russia.
“The ship is a great testament to the collaborative strength of Russian and Indian industries. It is an example of India's journey towards technological excellence through jointness,” he said.
Singh said India and Russia will enter a “new era” of cooperation by leveraging each other's expertise in areas such as artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, space exploration and counter-terrorism.
The construction of the ship was closely monitored by an Indian team of specialists from the 'Warship Overseeing Team' stationed in Kaliningrad.
The 3,900-ton ship with a length of 125 meters packs a deadly punch and is an impressive blend of Russian and Indian advanced technologies and best practices in warship construction.
The ship's new design offers improved stealth capabilities and better stability properties, officials said.
With the cooperation of Indian Navy specialists and the Severnoye Design Bureau, the ship's indigenous content has been improved to an impressive 26 percent, the officials said.
The major Indian defense companies involved in the project included BrahMos Aerospace Private Limited, Bharat Electronics Limited, Keltron, Tata's Nova Integrated Systems, Elcome Marine, Johnson Controls India and others.
INS Tushil is an upgraded Krivak III frigate from Project 1135.6.
The warship is the result of the continuous toil of hundreds of shipyard workers along with multiple Russian and Indian Original Equipment Makers (OEMs), said one of the officials quoted above.
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