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Are there any prototypes of 105mm Arjun left? Can they be looked into as light tanks for mountainous areas?
It is not as simple as some people point out. Blaming DRDO for evey delay has become a national passtime for the security establishment. Nobody bothers to understand why those delays occured in the first place.
Lets start with the Arjun MBT. When it was first conceptualised in 1970s, it was to be similar to the contemporary soviet tanks of the period, with certain enhancements. The requirements demanded by the army for the tank had already been standard equipments across Soviet and NATO armies for some years, and indeed would approach obsolescence by the time the Arjun was to be inducted in 1984.
The army had a glaring lack of even short term vision when issuing the original GSQR, which ensures that when Arjun became a reality in 1980s, it was already an obsolete platform with a 105mm gun, when the rest had moved onto 120mm and 125mm bore guns. Even then the blame was put squarely on DRDO, who had just followed the GSQR set.
Then the Army was faced with the spectre of the heavy American M1 Abrahams being supplied to the PA, with significantly superior armor protection and a newer main Gun, the army turned to the DRDO and issued a completely new set of requirements. It now wanted a western style tank with superior firepower and protection. In a single move, the army changed the requirements from medium tank to a heavy tank, and then set a weight limit of 50 tons, which was impractical from the start given the four man crew.
The DRDO was left with no option but to accede to army. The entire tank had to be designed anew. The engine, the suspension, the tracks, the track width, the electronics, the FCS, the transmission had to be redesigned from the start. None had been designed for the new requirements the army issued. The entire previous years had gone to waste.
So why is it that everyone blames the DRDO for the long development time of the Arjun. Essentially, the DRDO developed two tanks, one a medium Arjun with a 105mm gun and the heavy second with a 120mm gun and considerably thicker armor.
It is standard practise when issuing GSQR for any new large project to take into account the development time of the object. The requirements set are set according to what the army will want 10-15 years from now, what will be standard when the equipment comes into service. The IA everytime put forward a requirement according to what they wanted immediately. There was no consideration to the time needed for developing the project. As if it was halwa to develop a new gen tank.
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