Next issue is where is it supposed to serve. It might come in very handy over the Indian ocean for checking Chinese fleets with anti-ship cruise missiles but the most immediate threat is the Chinese SSN & SSBN class subs slipping freely through the Navy's detection net and popping all over the Indian ocean.
That is the whole point, you will never be able to counter Chinese subs unless you hook up a TAS to every naval resource that can provide chase and persistence. Only way that is going to happen is when you free up your resources from surface search and surface attacks.
Similar predicament is faced by the PLAAN vis a vis US+Jap+South Korean subs and that is why they got so many bombers to take on the surface challenge.
Currently we are progressing well towards messing up the submarine challenge. The P8I are good for surface search only and giving the big picture of a big Indian Ocean. The limitations of P8I can be mitigated and its improved features better leveraged if the bombers are thrown into the mix.
It is really sad that the Tu-142M will be retired instead of being upgraded for Brahmos launch. Soon we will have a big gap in this area. Su-30MKI will take only 1 Brahmos and will have very little persistence. IAF has conducted long range long endurance trainings on Su-30MKI but these will still leave you huffing and puffing to properly cover the long stretches of oceans. Something that the bombers are able to do with internal resources only and on a regular basis.
To top that these bombers can shift from sub-strategic to strategic to supra-strategic roles in the blink of an eye. There is no other asset that can do that - not the destroyers, not the subs, nothing. Su-30MKI will be able to do that but Su-30MKI is good only with the use of precious as gold Refuelers. In very near future the IAF will need all its refuelers just to keep tabs on the Chinese activities in Tibet and Karakoram. These refuelers will not be made available to Indian Navy on demand. Indian Navy will need to run on its own two propellors.
Look at it like this. An effective bomber force cannot do only one thing. That is go and fight underwater. And actually the bombers may actually end up doing that too in near future with the rocket powered wing-rigged torpedoes and radio-sonobouys and ultra high resolution ISAR becoming available at cheaper rates.
I would rather lease 8 Akulas from Russia for the same price.
Now compare that to a Tu-22M3 that will come for a billion apiece or all those stealth frigates that cost upwards of $400 million each.
Tu-22M3 aren't gonna come cheap either. Considering that it's American equivalent B-1B has lifecycle costs running into $2 billion plus per unit and also the fact that Russians nowadays are quoting western level prices without the western level of sophistication it's seems like a confused idea to me.
If you can really get 8 Akulas for the price of 1 Tu-22-M3, then by god, that is what we should be doing. But mostly it is the exact opposite. You will get 8 Tu-22-M3 for the price of one Akula-2, reckoned on capital cost basis only. And running costs are not limited to Tu-22-M3 or B-1B only. Even Akula-2 have running costs. You can do the math after that.
Besides using American cost structure to understand Russian costing systems is not going to help much if you really want to understand the operating costs involved. Americans don't chafe at just throwing the problem back at the suppliers. Americans get to maintain high tempo for long durations by doing that. Unfortunately it costs a ship load of cash to do that. You want to do that you have to be willing to rob and rape a few small countries every few decades. Can you a vegetarian Indian do that? Russian systems are OTOH are made for upkeep on the battlefield. They design things in a simpler manner. Only idiots and thieves can go wrong with their products.
We have zero CAS capability. Tu-22M3 cannot do Close Air Support (CAS).
Now that is a genuine criticism but nothing much can be done about that. Nobody ever designed a CAS capable bomber.