France's Naval Group withdraws from Indian Navy's P75I project to acquire 6 new submarines

French company Naval Group on Tuesday said it is unable to participate in Centre's P-75I project, under which six conventional submarines are to be domestically built for the Indian Navy, due to conditions mentioned in the request for proposal (RFP) related to air independent propulsion (AIP) system.

Naval Group's announcement comes a day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Paris where he is scheduled meet recently re-elected French President Emmanuel Macron.

AIP system allows a conventional submarine to stay submerged in water at higher speeds for a longer period of time.

The Project 75 (India)-class submarines, or P-75I, for short, are a planned class of diesel-electric submarines, which are to be built for the Indian Navy. The P-75I class is a follow-on of the P-75 class submarines of the Indian Navy.

Under this project, the Indian Navy intends to acquire six conventional, diesel-electric attack submarines, which will also feature advanced capabilities - including air-independent propulsion (AIP), ISR, special operations forces (SOF), anti-ship warfare (AShW), anti-submarine warfare (ASW), anti-surface warfare (ASuW), land-attack capabilities and other features. All six submarines are expected to be constructed in India, under the Make in India initiative.

On 21 January 2020, the Government of India (GoI) shortlisted two Indian shipyards - Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and Mazagon Dock Limited (MDL), as the two Indian finalists in P-75I.

Concurrently, the GoI also shortlisted five foreign Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM), as finalists in P-75I - ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) of Germany, Rubin Design Bureau of Russia, Navantia of Spain, Naval Group of France, and Daewoo Shipping & Marine Engineering (DSME) of South Korea.

The Barracuda class (or Suffren class) is a nuclear attack submarine, designed by the French shipbuilder Naval Group (formerly known as DCNS and DCN) for the French Navy.

The class is powered by a nuclear propulsion system using a new hybrid design that provides electric propulsion for economical cruise speeds and turbo-mechanical propulsion for higher speeds. The submarine can reach a top speed of 25 knots (46 km/f; 29 mph) with an unlimited range of 10 years. It has a crew of 60 people including 12 officers and 48 sailors.

The armament of the submarine includes four 533mm torpedo tubes and 20 storage racks for various weapons including F21 Artemis heavy torpedoes, Exocet SM.39 Block 2 anti-ship missiles with a range of 50 km, SCALP naval cruise missiles with a range of over 1 000 km, and FG29 mines. Two mines can be carried per weapon rack.

(with inputs from PTI)