India's Battle Tank Upgrade Programmes to Boost Fleet Capabilities

With Arjun's future in doubt and the Indian Army's Armoured Regiments looking for futuristic combat vehicles, it is now clear that the upgrade programmes for the T-72s and T-90s are the first steps taken to ensure the force levels are maintained and the combatedge remains intact

- 

India is preparing to convert all of its main battle tanks from the T-72 and the T-90 fleet into fighting fit machines. The upgrade programme for the two main battle tanks currently in the Indian Army's fleet includes changes in their power plant and enabling their night fighting capabilities. In the army’s long-term planning, the T-72 — which will be replaced by the more advanced T-90 only gradually — will continue to equip almost half of the Army's 59 tank regiments as far in the future as up to 2022.

Christened as Ajeya, the Indian T-72 tank is a licence manufactured Russian T-72M1, which started in the late 1970's. There are some 1,700 T-72s in the Indian Army armoured regiment fleet now. In fact, the T-72s became the backbone of the Indian combat vehicles fleet in the 1990s when India struggled with the development of the Arjun Mk-I tanks by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The T-72M1 were in need of overhauling and repairing, and this upgrade programme is a manifestation of those needs.

The latest in the series of upgrade programmes for the T-72s that the Indian Army has been working on in the last two decades is the changes it wants to effect on the tank's power plant. Ukraine, despite its troubles with Russia in the recent years, has submitted offers on its own to take up the upgrade of the Indian T-72 main battle tank fleet.

Ukranian state-owned Ukroboronprom is said to have submitted proposals before August 2016 to extend the life and upgrade the capabilities of the Indian Army’s T-72 Main Battle Tank (MBT) fleet. The Indian side is also said to be interested in placing an order for the modernisation of T-72 in Ukraine. Currently, the parties are negotiating on the cooperation for the project for upgrading of at least 1,000 T-72 tanks.