The Navy needs 24 MCMVs to guard the east and west coasts but is making do with only four 30-year-old minesweepers at present.
NEW DELHI: In yet another major blow to the 'Make in India' plan in the defence sector, the government has cancelled the Rs 32,000 crore project to construct 12 advanced minesweepers in collaboration with South Korea at the Goa Shipyard.
Advanced minesweepers or mine counter-measure vessels (MCMVs) are around 900-tonne specialised warships that detect, track and destroy underwater mines laid by enemy forces to choke harbours and offshore installations, disrupt shipping and maritime trade.
The Navy, which began this acquisition case way back in July 2005, needs 24 MCMVs to guard the east and west coasts but is making do with only four 30-year-old minesweepers at present.
This "big operational capability gap" is all the more alarming because Chinese nuclear and conventional submarines, which can quietly lay mines, are regularly making forays into the Indian Ocean now.
Top sources say the government has directed the Goa Shipyard to start the entire process afresh for the already long-delayed MCMV project, which was strongly pushed by Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar when he was the defence minister, after scrapping the protracted commercial negotiations with South Korean shipyard Kangnam.
"Goa Shipyard has been asked to issue a new global expression of interest (EoI) for the MCMVs. The fresh RFP (reque st for proposal) or tender will follow thereafter.
Final negotiations with Kangnam were stuck for long because it wanted deviations from the original RFP. There were also some ToT (transfer of technology), build strategy and cost problems," said a source.
No major "Make in India" defence project has actually kicked off in the last three to four years due to lack of requisite political push and follow-through, bureaucratic bottlenecks and longwinded procedures, commercial and technical squabbles, as was reported by TOI in October last year.
At least six mega projects worth over Rs 3.5 lakh crore, ranging from future infantry combat vehicles, light utility helicopters and naval multi-role choppers to new-generation stealth submarines, fifth-generation fighter aircraft and MCMVs, remain stuck at different stages without the final contracts being inked.
The entire MCMV project will of course have to begin anew now. But Goa Shipyard chairman Rear Admiral Shekhar Mital (retd), on being contacted, said he was "grateful" for defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman's "quick decision" to break the continuing logjam in "the all-important project".
"Navy has accorded topmost priority to it. The decision to issue the fresh RFP will see the project move very fast as all intricate technical details and specifications of the MCMVs have been finalized over the last two years," he said.
The EoI will soon be issued to Kangnam, Intermarine (Italy) and other foreign shipyards that specialize in building MCMVs, with non-magnetic hulls and high-definition sonars, acoustic and magnetic sweeps to detect marooned and drifting mines.
The vessels then use remote-controlled systems like small underwater vehicles to detonate the mines at safe distances. The Goa Shipyard, incidentally, has already invested over Rs 700 core in building infrastructure for construction of the MCMVs, which will take almost a decade now.
(This article was originally published in The Times of India)
