Chief of Naval Staff inaugurates Nibe Defence and Aerospace plant, says step towards ‘Atma Nirbharta’

Navy Chief Admiral R Hari Kumar on Monday praised the role of Indian industry in achieving self-reliance in Defence sector by 2047 at the inauguration of the manufacturing plant of Nibe Defence and Aerospace Limited in Maharashtra’s Pune.

Nibe Industries is one of the leading medium- and small enterprise firms working in the defence sector. They have been working on multiple projects, including canisters for vertical missile launchers, road-mobile launchers for missile systems, and launchers for Pinaka multi-barrel rocket launcher systems.

“A very substantial capability that has been built in a very short time… So this is a tremendous capability for Atma Nirbharta. If you want to make defence equipment in the country, then you need the equipment, the machines,” said Admiral R Hari Kumar.

“This is a fully automated facility and it will make a substantial difference in the ability to make weapon-grade equipment for ships, airframes, weapon systems on board ships or submarines, torpedo tubes and anything that requires very high precision,” he added.

The Naval Chief reiterated the force’s commitment to the national leadership of being fully self-reliant in the years to come.

“We have committed to our national leadership that till 2047 tuck, we will become Atma Nirbhar, and for that, we require the help of industry,” he said.

Earlier, speaking to ANI R Hari Kumar, said the Indian Navy is going to carry out major operations involving the fleets of both of its aircraft carriers off the West coast in the next ten days.

He said both aircraft carriers, including the INS Vikramaditya and made-in-India INS Vikrant, would be present in Vishakhapatnam during the ‘Exercise Milan’ but the twin carrier operations would be seen only after 10 days.

“Both the carriers are going to be there for Exercise Milan. However, the operationalisation of the carriers, the integration to the fleet and participation of the fleet is going to happen in ten days,” the Navy chief said.

He further said on completion of Exercise Milan, “The carriers as well as the escort ships will all go to the western seaboard. We are going to integrate them”.

“The tempo of operation is quite high in the western seaboard right now because 10 of our ships are deployed for anti-drone measures and another 3-4 ships are deployed for anti-piracy operations, which is unprecedented. This wasn’t the case earlier,” the Navy chief said.

The 2024 edition of the Indian Navy’s (IN) Multilateral Naval Exercise (MILAN) will be hosted in Visakhapatnam from February 19 to 27. The exercise will include a variety of exercises, including seamanship drills, tactical manoeuvres, and simulations of complex operational scenarios.

The theme for 2024 is “Camaraderie Cohesion Collaboration”. The MILAN exercise is a biennial event that has been held since 1995, except for 2001, 2005, 2016, and 2020.