Indigenous Warship Building and "Aatmanirbharta" in Defence Production

Indigenous warship building means designing and building naval ships inside India, using Indian shipyards, Indian designers and, as far as possible, Indian-made steel, engines, weapons and electronics. Aatmanirbharta is the Hindi word for self-reliance. In defence, it means India should be able to make the weapons it needs instead of buying them from other countries. The Indian Navy is often called a "builder's navy", because almost all of its new ships are now built in India.

Why does India need its own warships?

A navy that buys ships from abroad depends on the selling country for spare parts, repairs and upgrades. In a war or a crisis, that country could delay supplies or refuse them. Building at home removes this risk. It also keeps defence money inside the country, creates jobs in shipyards and small factories, and builds skills that can later be used for exports.

India has a coastline of over 7,500 km and big interests in the Indian Ocean, so a strong and self-reliant navy is a strategic need.

Where did it start?

India's warship building grew step by step.

• 1960s: Early small warships were built in Indian yards. In 1964, the Navy set up its own design team, the Directorate of Naval Design, now known as the Warship Design Bureau (WDB). It has designed more than 19 classes of ships.
• 1972: INS Nilgiri, a Leander-class frigate, was commissioned on 3 June 1972. It was built at Mazagon Dock, Mumbai, with help from the British firm Yarrow. It is called the first major warship built in India.
• 1980s: The Godavari-class frigates became the Navy's first major warships of Indian design.
• 2000s-2010s: India built destroyers, stealth frigates, corvettes and the Arihant-class nuclear submarine programme.
• 2022: INS Vikrant, India's first indigenous aircraft carrier, was commissioned on 2 September 2022 at Cochin Shipyard. It was designed by the WDB and has about 76% indigenous content.
• Today: Around 45 to 54 warships and submarines are being built in Indian shipyards (estimates differ by date). All of them are being built in India.

How does a warship reach the Navy?

A warship passes through fixed stages. Think of it like building a house, then moving in.

1. Contract: The Ministry of Defence signs a contract with a shipyard after approvals under the Defence Acquisition Procedure.
2. Keel laying: The first blocks of the ship's base are placed on the building berth. This marks the formal start of construction.
3. Launch: The hull (the main body) is complete enough to float, so the ship is put into the water for the first time. It is still far from ready.
4. Outfitting: Engines, weapons, sensors, cabins and wiring are fitted.
5. Trials: Harbour trials and then sea trials test every system.
6. Delivery: The shipyard formally hands the ship over to the Navy.
7. Commissioning: The Navy formally takes the ship into service. The naval ensign (flag) is raised, and the ship gets the prefix INS (Indian Naval Ship). Only now is it a warship on active duty.

Students often mix up launch, delivery and commissioning. For example, INS Samarthak was launched in 2024, delivered in August 2026 and commissioned in October 2026.

Who builds the ships?

• Defence public sector shipyards under the Ministry of Defence: Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders (MDL), Mumbai; Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers (GRSE), Kolkata; Goa Shipyard Limited (GSL); and Hindustan Shipyard Limited (HSL), Visakhapatnam.
• Cochin Shipyard Limited (CSL): a public sector shipyard under the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, not the Ministry of Defence. It built INS Vikrant.
• Private shipyards: for example L&T at Kattupalli. A ship like Samarthak shows that private yards can now build large naval vessels, adding capacity beyond the public yards.

What policies support self-reliance?

• Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020: The rulebook for buying defence equipment. It gives top preference to Buy (Indian-IDDM), meaning Indigenously Designed, Developed and Manufactured, which needs at least 50% indigenous content.
• Positive Indigenisation Lists (PILs): Lists of items the forces must buy only from Indian makers after a set date. The Department of Military Affairs issued five such lists between August 2020 and October 2023, covering 509 major items. The Department of Defence Production has separate lists for parts and sub-systems.
• Strategic Partnership model (2017): Lets selected Indian private firms team up with foreign makers for big platforms such as submarines.
• Shipbuilding package (September 2025): The Union Cabinet approved a ₹69,725 crore package for shipbuilding, including the Shipbuilding Financial Assistance Scheme (extended to 2036), a ₹25,000 crore Maritime Development Fund and a Shipbuilding Development Scheme. It mainly supports commercial shipbuilding, but it also strengthens yards that build naval ships.

India's position and results

India's defence production reached a record of about ₹1.5 lakh crore in 2024-25, and defence exports reached a record ₹23,622 crore. The government has set targets of ₹3 lakh crore of production and ₹50,000 crore of exports by 2029. The Navy aims to have about 175 to 200 warships by 2035, and nearly all new ones are planned to be built in India.

Commonly confused concepts

• Launch vs commissioning: Launch means the hull first goes into water; commissioning means the ship formally joins the Navy as an active warship.
• Indigenous content vs indigenous design: A ship can be built in India using a foreign design (like the 1972 Nilgiri) or designed in India too (like INS Vikrant). Indigenous content is the share of value made in India; design is about who drew the plans.
• Make in India vs Aatmanirbhar Bharat: Make in India (2014) is a broad campaign to attract manufacturing into India, including by foreign firms. Aatmanirbhar Bharat (2020) stresses self-reliance, including Indian ownership of design and technology.
• Multi-purpose vessel vs frontline warship: An MPV like Samarthak mainly supports trials, surveillance and relief work. Frontline warships like destroyers and frigates are built mainly to fight.

Issues, criticism and the way forward

• Delays: Many warship projects finish years late. Samarthak's deliveries were first planned to begin in May 2025 but the first ship was delivered in August 2026.
• Import of key parts: "75% indigenous" still means a quarter of value, often engines, some weapons and electronics, comes from abroad. Marine gas turbines and some advanced sensors are still largely imported.
• Cost: Indian shipyards can be costlier than big foreign yards, because they build fewer ships and have smaller supply chains.
• Shipyard capacity: Public yards are full of orders, so private yards need steady orders to stay healthy.
• The way forward: Experts and the Navy suggest faster movement from prototype to production, steady orders to private and public yards, more Indian work on engines and sensors, and closer links with DRDO, start-ups and MSMEs.

Concepts to Know

• Indigenisation: Replacing imported parts and systems with ones made in India.
• Displacement: The weight of water a ship pushes aside when it floats. It is the usual way to measure a ship's size, in tonnes.
• Knot: A unit of speed at sea. One knot is one nautical mile per hour, about 1.85 km per hour.
• Hull: The main body or shell of a ship.
• Naval ensign: The flag a naval ship flies to show which navy it belongs to.
• DRDO: The Defence Research and Development Organisation, the government body that develops new defence technology.
• MSME: Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, that is, small businesses that often make parts for big projects.