New Delhi, June 28
India and France today decided to go in for joint production of Scorpene submarines here which will give the Indian Navy advanced ship detection and missile launching capabilities, much superior to the Agosta class submarines acquired by Pakistan two years ago.
“Negotiations are going on. The number of submarines to be jointly produced in India has not been defined yet. It’s going to be an ongoing programme”, Defence Secretary Yogendra Narain said after the fourth meeting of the Indo-French High Committee on Defence Cooperation.
The Defence Secretary, while ruling out joint production of the French made Mirage-2000 fighter aircraft or stealth ships, said India had also identified collaboration with French firms on radars and purchase of guidance systems for missiles.
The Scorpene submarines, known as ‘silent killers’, will in all likelihood be produced at the Mazagaon dockyards under the Indian Navy’s Project-75. The dockyard had built two HDW submarines in the past. The submarines are built in France by the Naval Construction Directorate (DCN).
Mr Narain and French Defence Minister’s Special Representative Jean Bernand Ouvrieu, who signed the minutes of the two-day meeting, described the deliberations as constructive and one which would take defence relations beyond the buyer-seller relationship between the two countries.
“During the last two days’ deliberations, we tried to ensure that from a mere buyer-seller relationship, we should go in for joint production as in the case of helicopters. We are now identifying other areas,” he said.
He said the three sub-committees under the high committee — research and technology, military cooperation and strategic issues and strategic dialogue — had given in their reports and the two countries were now heading for increased cooperation.
UNI
