INS Vikrant entered the Indian Navy on 2 September 2022. The commissioning ceremony, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, marked a change in India’s naval manufacturing history: the country had brought its first domestically built aircraft carrier into service. The ship also carried a much longer institutional history into the fleet. [1] [2]
Designed by the Navy and constructed at Cochin Shipyard in Kochi, Vikrant was the product of contracts concluded in May 2007, December 2014 and October 2019. Its keel had been laid in February 2009 and the vessel launched in August 2013. Those dates place substantial construction under the UPA government, with later contracting, completion and delivery under Modi’s governments. [2]
The work behind the hull
The construction record was uneven. In its 2016 audit, the Comptroller and Auditor General found that design work continuing alongside construction had disrupted progress and demanded more shipyard effort and resources than envisaged. The audit also recorded the Navy’s acknowledgement that delayed procurement and delivery of aviation equipment had affected construction. These were failures in sequencing and supply, alongside the engineering difficulty of a first-of-its-kind project. [3]
The completed vessel represented a substantial domestic production effort. At delivery in July 2022, the defence ministry put its indigenous content at 76%. It identified contributions from major engineering companies and more than 100 smaller enterprises, as well as warship-grade steel developed through collaboration between the Navy, DRDO and SAIL. [2]
The percentage did not mean every critical system originated in India. Vikrant’s four LM2500 gas turbines came from GE technology. The manufacturer says the turbine kits were produced in Ohio and assembled and tested by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited in Bengaluru. Domestic shipbuilding and dependence on overseas equipment existed within the same vessel. [4]
That distinction makes the industrial accomplishment more specific. A country can develop the ability to design a carrier and integrate its machinery while still relying on foreign suppliers for parts of the propulsion system. HAL’s assembly and testing were Indian industrial work; the underlying turbine design and imported kits remained part of an international supply chain. [4]
From commissioning to the flight deck
Commissioning was followed by further aviation work. On 6 February 2023, naval test pilots landed the LCA Navy prototype and a MiG-29K on Vikrant during flight-integration trials. The defence ministry described these as steps towards combat readiness. The prototype landing demonstrated compatibility between aircraft and carrier; it did not establish that a fleet of operational indigenous naval fighters had entered service. [5]
The trials placed another set of specialists at the centre of the story. After the designers, welders, machinery suppliers and shipyard engineers came the test pilots and aviation teams. The vessel delivered by the yard now had to function as an airfield at sea, with aircraft brought aboard through a programme of certification and integration. [5]