INS VIRAAT

Subject: Defence

Context: INS Viraat is the second aircraft carrier to be broken in India in the last six years. In 2014, INS Vikrant, which played a crucial role in the 1971 Indo-Pak war, was dismantled in Mumbai.

Concept:

• Viraat a Centaur class aircraft carrier weighing 27,800 tonnes, served in the British Navy as HMS Hermes for 25 years.
• Viraat played a major role in Operation Jupiter in 1989 during the Sri Lankan Peacekeeping operation. It also saw action during Op Parakram in 2001-2002, post the terrorist attack on Parliament.
• The indigenous Advance Light Helicopters ‘Dhruv’ and the Russian twin rotor Kamov-31 have also operated from the ship.
• It was decommissioned in March 2017, and the Navy had been incurring expenditure since then on its upkeep, such as the provision of electricity and water, and repairs. It was also taking up space in the crowded Naval dockyard.
• There had been demands from various quarters to not let Viraat go the way of Vikrant, India’s first carrier that was eventually scrapped.
• In 2014, INS Vikrant, which played a role in the 1971 war with Pakistan was broken down in Mumbai.
• India is currently doing with only the 44,500-tonne INS Vikramaditya, the refurbished Admiral Gorshkov inducted from Russia in November 2013.
• The trials of the first indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC-I, to be named as INS Vikrant) being built at the Cochin Shipyard have been derailed by the pandemic.
• The government’s approvals for a third carrier, the 65,000-tonne IAC-II (tentatively christened INS Vishal) has been pending since May 2015.
• India needs aircraft carriers to secure the seas of the Indo-Pacific, to maintain peace, secure trade routes, and provide security to the region.