That is to say if it gets funded soon..
Last i heard navy was asking 60000 crore for that 65k ton ship and MoD folded..
For comparison, that is 80% more than HMS QE for a smaller ship.
So they said a 50k ton a/c is now being considered which will cost 50000 crore.
The later MoD signs it, the harder inflation will penalise the total cost of program.
And then, there's the airwing.
IAC 2 can kick off once the IN accepts certain facts of reality rather than continuing to behave like spoiled children
- STOBAR is a dead end philosophy. STOVL will force you to beg Unkil to let you buy the F-35 unless you expect HAL to make Tejas V/STOL. So CATOBAR is the only realistic option going forward.
- CATOBAR requires either huge amounts of steam for traditional gear or huge amounts of electrical power for EMALs. Either way the only realistic way of sustaining both alongside the expected increases in general power consumption loads for other shipboard systems is Nuclear propulsion.
- CSL being a civil / military mixed use facility will never get clearance for nuclear security protocol. There is no point in further infrastructure investment at CSL
- An aircraft carrier has two distinct uses, Sea Control and Power Projection. The former can be done on a smaller vsl like Vikramaditya or Vikrant but the latter requires a larger vessel with a diverse air wing.
IN must decide which it wants to pursue and size the vessel accordingly or drop the whole idea entirely and focus on other parts of the fleet like SSNs for sea denial capabilities