India Advances Naval Modernisation with Construction of Eight

India is taking a major step towards strengthening its indigenous naval capabilities with the construction of eight Next Generation Corvettes (NGCs), marking a significant milestone in the country's warship design and shipbuilding ecosystem.

Under the contracts, Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers (GRSE) will construct five corvettes, while Goa Shipyard Limited (GSL) will build the remaining three.

According to the Ministry of Defence, this is the first project in which the ships will be indigenously designed by the Indian Navy and constructed by Defence Public Sector Undertakings (DPSUs) selected through a competitive process.

The Next Generation Corvettes will feature state-of-the-art technologies, including advanced missiles, weapons systems and sensor suites. These platforms will be capable of undertaking missions across the air, surface and sub-surface domains.

Their induction is expected to significantly enhance the Indian Navy's operational capabilities, particularly in safeguarding maritime trade routes, conducting anti-surface and anti-submarine warfare, strengthening coastal defence, undertaking littoral combat operations, and carrying out maritime surveillance and presence missions.

The project will also provide a major boost to India's indigenous shipbuilding ecosystem by strengthening collaboration between DPSUs, private shipyards and domestic industrial partners, including Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).

The construction programme is expected to generate approximately 72 lakh person-days of employment in shipyards and 460 lakh person-days in ancillary industries and MSMEs over the next ten years.

The initiative reinforces India's commitment to self-reliance in defence manufacturing and the development of advanced indigenous naval platforms under the Aatmanirbhar Bharat vision.