India’s Tank Force: Ready for War?

The Indian Army fields one of the largest tank forces in the world. With almost 4,000 main battle tanks currently in service, divided into 97 armored regiments, India outnumbers Pakistan’s main battle tank (MBT) force of around 2,600 armored vehicles—the Indian Army’s most likely opponent in a tank battle. However, while Pakistan has been in the process of significantly upgrading and modernizing its MBT force with its T-80UD Al-Khalid MBT series, among others, India appears to have fallen behind and its local advantage has eroded.

India’s MBT force consists of three principal models. The bulk of the force consists of 2,400+ T-72 Ajeya tanks co-produced by India, Russia, and Poland. Around 1,000 T-72 Ajeyas have been upgraded with new engines, new fire control systems, and new communication system elements. Another 1,000 are slated to be upgraded in the years ahead under the Combat Improved Ajeya program. There are estimates that around 70 percent of Indian T-72s are not fully combat ready.  

The Indian Army also operates two variants of the third-generation Russian T-90 MBT (a modernized T-72)—the T-90S Bhishma and T-90M. While some sources say that India is operating over 1,200 license-built T-90S Bhishma and T-90M MBTs, it unclear how many have, in fact, been delivered, and are operational. A May 2015 estimate by The Diplomat put the number at around 500. India plans to field over 2,000 T-90 variants by 2020.

Repeated delays in India’s first indigenous main battle tank program—the Arjun MK-I program—was a major reason for the Indian Army’s decision to acquire (and later license-produce) T-90 MBTs from Russia in the 2000s. In fact, the Arjun MBT was originally supposed to be inducted into the Indian Army in the 1980s. However, a flawed tank design concept—among other things, the tank was simply too heavy and had too little horsepower—next to a botched procurement and testing process, led to the project almost being abandoned on multiple occasions, which resulted in a development time of over 40 years.

The Arjun MK-I tank, based on the German Leopard II MBT design, was developed by the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) and manufactured by  the Indian Ordnance Factory’s production facility in Avadi in southern India. However, it was only in 1996 that the Indian Ministry of Defense decided to mass-produce the Arjun. The Indian Army was instructed to procure 124 Arjun MK-I tanks by the DRDO so that the factory could remain in operation although the tank’s flaws were apparent including the heavy weight, which precluded its use along India’s western border given that the bridges close to the border cannot carry armored fighting vehicles heavier than 60 tons. Nevertheless, during comparative trials in 2010, a squadron (around 14 tanks) of Arjun MK-I MBTs outperformed the Indian Army T-90 MBT.

Last May, The Diplomat reported that around 75 percent of Arjun MK-I MBTs have been grounded due to various technical problems—e.g., the tank’s transmission system or targeting and thermal sights were malfunctioning or underperforming—and missing spare parts. Over 90 separate technical issues were recorded. As of August 2016, it remains unclear how many Arjun MK-Is have returned to active service. The tank is also still not fitted with a new indigenously developed anti-tank missile and other new types of ammunition specifically designed for the Arjun, such as the so-called Penetration-Cum Blast (PCB) and Thermobaric (TB) ammunition.

DRDO has been working on an improved version of the Arjun, the MK-II. The upgraded Arjun variant has also outperformed the T-90 in comparative trials and features more than 93 improvements over the MK-I. About 60 percent of the components of the tank are locally manufactured (the first batch of MK-I had less than 30 percent), which makes it less dependent on foreign imports in order to avoid spare part bottlenecks. The Indian Army has placed an order for 118 Arjun MK-II MBTs slated to be delivered by the end of 2016. Yet, similar to the older variant, the Arjun MK-II is still too heavy to be used along India’s borders. In fact, with 68 tons, it is even heavier than the MK-I variant. As a consequence, the tank’s induction has been delayed. India’s Minister of Defense Manohar Parrikar has ordered the DRDO to reduce the tank’s weight before any future induction.

Perhaps the Indian Defense Ministry has already abandoned plans for the Arjun to become the mainstay of India’s future tank force. In June 2015, the Indian Army released a global request for information (RFI) to develop a multi-purpose Future Ready Combat Vehicle (FRCV)--a platform for as many as 11 different tracked vehicles--in order to replace the T-72 MBTs. “The Indian Army is planning to design and develop a new generation, state-of-the-art combat vehicle platform for populating its armored fighting vehicle fleet in the coming decade. This vehicle, which will be called the future ready combat vehicle (FRCV), will form the base platform for the main battle tank which is planned to replace the existing T-72 tanks in the Armored Corps,” the RFI read. While the Indian Army wants to induct the FRCV by the mid-2020s, it appears unlikely that will happen given the country’s botched military procurement process.

India’s inability to field an indigenously developed MBT is just one of a host of problems plaguing the Indian Army’s Armored Corps. Low operational readiness, lack of adequate combined arms training, and an armor doctrine that has not been updated to address the shifting geopolitical situation in South Asia have all contributed to India falling behind its archrival Pakistan and its peer competitor China when it comes to tank warfare in the 21st century.