A long-planned plan by India to purchase 30 multi-mission, armed Predator drones from the United States for the three services at a cost of more than $3 billion is nearing completion. According to people familiar with the situation, New Delhi is in advanced talks with the US to purchase these drones in order to beef up its overall surveillance apparatus along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China and in the Indian Ocean.
The three services are purchasing the long-endurance hunter-killer drones because they can perform a variety of tasks such as maritime surveillance, anti-submarine warfare, over-the-horizon targeting, and hitting stationary ground targets. The MQ-9B drone, a variant of the MQ-9 ‘Reaper,’ is said to have fired a modified Hellfire missile that killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri last month in Kabul’s centre.
According to reliable defence establishment sources, negotiations are underway between New Delhi and Washington for a government-to-government purchase of drones manufactured by US defence major General Atomics. These sources also denied that the deal was dead in the water. Dr. Vivek Lall, CEO of General Atomics Global Corporation, told PTI that the two governments’ acquisition negotiations are well underway.
‘We understand that the MQ-9B acquisition programme is well underway between the US and Indian governments,’ he said. ‘ Any questions about those discussions should be directed specifically to the governments involved. General Atomics is ready to assist India and values our long-standing relationship’, Lall defined.
The discussions are primarily focused on resolving concerns about the cost component, the arsenal, and technology sharing. According to what is known, the fourth two-plus-two foreign and defence ministerial dialogue between India and the United States took place in Washington in April. There was a discussion about the procurement proposal. General Atomics leased the Indian Navy two MQ-9B Sea Guardian drones for a year of surveillance in the Indian Ocean in 2020. The lease term was then extended.
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