India unveils its first nuclear submarine
VISAKHAPATNAM: In this file photo, the wife of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Gursharan Kaur breaks a coconut on the hull of India's first nuclear-powered submarine INS Arihant during a ceremony at Visakhapatnam. – AFP
NEW DELHI: India announced yesterday that its first indigenously-built nuclear submarine is ready for sea trials, a step before it becomes fully operational, and called it a "giant stride" for the nation. India unveiled the 6,000-ton INS Arihant-Destroyer of Enemies-in 2009 as part of a project to built five such vessels which would be armed with nuclear-tipped missiles and torpedoes. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said he was "delighted to learn that the nuclear propulsion reactor on board INS Arihant, India's first indigenous nuclear powered submarine, has now achieved criticality".
Criticality refers to the point at which a nuclear reaction is self-sustaining. Singh described the development as "a giant stride in the progress of our indigenous technological capabilities" and said he hoped to see the submarine commissioned soon. Arihant is powered by an 85-megawatt nuclear reactor and can reach 44 kilometers an hour (24 knots), according to defense officials. It will carry a 95-member crew.
India earlier activated the atomic reactor on-board the INS Arihant, paving the way it to begin sea trials. The Indian navy inducted a Russian-leased nuclear submarine into service in April 2012, joining China, France, the United States, Britain and Russia in the elite club of countries with nuclear-powered vessels. Nuclear submarines can function underwater without needing to surface regularly to be recharged, unlike their conventional diesel-electric counterparts.
India is due to receive the first of six Franco-Spanish diesel-electric Scorpene submarines in 2015, part of a multi-billion dollar project to modernize its navy. The submarine announcement came just two days before India was due to launch its first indigenous aircraft carrier "INS Vikrant". The navy will launch its first indigenous aircraft carrier Monday at Kochi, making India only the fifth country in the world with the capability to build such vessels. The 40,000-tonne aircraft carrier sets a new global standard in terms of size and complexity, the defense ministry says.
After final fitting of equipment and extensive trials, the aircraft carrier is due to join the navy by 2018. It will ply the seas alongside the former Russian aircraft carrier "Admiral Gorshkov", now the "INS Vikramaditya", due to be delivered by year-end after a delay of more than four years. India has been Russia's top arms customer for years, but relations have frayed over delays and cost-overruns. India is spending tens of billions of dollars upgrading its mainly Soviet-era military hardware.
CLASHES ERUPT IN KASHMIR
In another development, fresh clashes erupted yesterday between groups of Hindus and Muslims in the Indian portion of Kashmir, wounding three people, police said. The rival groups also burned some homes in Paddar, a village about 50 kilometers north of the town of Kishtwar, where clashes between Muslims and Hindus during Muslim holiday celebrations Friday killed at least two people and injured 24.
Police rushed to Paddar yesterday to control the situation, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters. Three people who sustained gunshot wounds were evacuated by helicopter to a nearby hospital, the officer said. In Kishtwar, government forces fired warning shots yesterday to enforce a strict curfew and to push angry people back into their homes following Friday's deadly clashes.
Jammu-Kashmir state director-general of police Ashok Prasad said the situation was tense yesterday, although no new violence was reported in Kishtwar. Troops in armored vehicles drove through the streets of Kishtwar, where the rival groups had attacked each other Friday with firearms, stones and sticks. The town is 200 kilometers southeast of Srinagar, the main city in Indian-controlled Kashmir. Scores of shops, vehicles, two hotels and one gas station were set on fire by the mobs on Friday, police said. The rioters also looted guns from a private arms shop in the area.
The trouble erupted Friday after Hindus objected to Muslims shouting pro-independence slogans during the Eid Al-Fitr holiday, which caps the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. Anti-India feelings run deep in Kashmir, where about a dozen rebel groups have been fighting against Indian rule since 1989. More than 68,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed. The rebel groups have largely been suppressed by Indian troops in recent years, and resistance is now principally expressed through street protests.
One Muslim was burned to death and one Hindu died of gunshot wounds in Friday's clashes, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters. He said that 24 people were being treated in hospitals, but that their injuries were not life threatening. "The curfew is being strictly enforced. We are not taking any chances as the situation has the potential to have serious ramifications for the entire state," Prasad said. He said police were working to identify the troublemakers. Indian authorities ordered an inquiry into the rioting and replaced the local police chief and the top civil administrator as part their efforts to restore peace in the town.
Authorities asked all members of the Village Defense Committee in the area to hand their weapons over to the police. The government provided weapons to a more than 20,000-strong semiofficial force created in the early 1990s to counter insurgency in the region. The members are mostly drawn from Hindu community. Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan. The countries have fought two wars over its control since they won independence from Britain in 1947. The Indian portion of Kashmir is the only Muslim majority state in the predominantly Hindu country. – Agencie
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