India’s Troubled Arjun Battle Tank Ridden By Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Pakistani Border

At a time of high tensions with neighbouring China and Pakistan, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi rode atop an Indian built Arjun battle tank at the Longewala Post near the country’s western border with Pakistan. This follows a growing emphasis on developing the domestic defence sector to substitute foreign produced weaponry - with the Indian tank originally expected to replace Soviet T-72 tanks in frontline service. The Arjun has had a highly troubled history, beginning development almost 50 years ago in the early 1970s and seeing delays of around 30 years making it one of the longest battle tank development programs in world history. The Indian Army has itself been highly reluctant to purchase the Arjun, inducting just 124 tanks into service by mid-2018 which have continued to face severe technical issues leaving 75% of the units totally non operational. 

The Arjun has suffered from declining operational mobility due to a weight increase of over 50% as more heavy subsystems have been piled onto the vehicle without sufficient consideration for efficiency or weight reduction. Such issues were exacerbated by the fact that many of the technologies developed in the early and middle periods of the program became effectively obsolete by the mid-2010s - a consequence of the inefficient way the program was handled. While appearing to many a symbol of national pride, the Arjun’s future remains highly uncertain with the Army appearing to strongly favour purchases from Russia including new variants of the T-90 tank and in future very likely T-14 Armata tanks. Although more Arjun tanks are expected to be produced, as a means of further developing the domestic defence industry, they are unlikely to ever see deployments to sensitive frontline positions with their contribution to India’s operational capabilities arguably being superseded in importance by the tank’s propaganda value.