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India will buy 70 thousand AK-103 rifles from Russia

Increasing strength of Indian Air Force

The Indian Air Force has signed an agreement to buy 70 thousand AK-103 rifles from Russia under emergency procurement. It will replace the INSAS rifles present in the army. At a time when terrorist groups operating in India are likely to find weapons left by US troops in Afghanistan, the deal is crucial to boosting the IAF’s strength. The AK-103 rifles will be available to India only in the next few months. This will help the country’s army in dealing with terrorists.

According to government sources, the army currently needs about 1.5 lakh new assault rifles. Keeping this in mind, a contract worth about Rs 300 crore was signed last week under emergency provisions to procure 70,000 AK-103 assault rifles from Russia. Weapons will first be provided to the soldiers in the field areas along with sensitive air bases like Jammu and Kashmir, Srinagar. The remaining rifles will be supplied through the more advanced AK-203 rifle deal to be signed between India and Russia. The contract for AK-203 assault rifles is being done under the Army. The army needs about 6.5 lakh rifles to strengthen the firepower of its soldiers. At the same time, preparations are being made to buy 4,000 SI Sour Assault Rifles to meet the requirement of the Air Force.

Preparing to buy directly from Russia
In fact, India had signed an agreement with Russia in 2019 to manufacture 7.5 lakh AK-203 rifles at the Ordnance Factory Board’s Korba plant in Uttar Pradesh, but work has not started at the plant. This is the reason why India has decided to buy 70 thousand rifles directly from Russia. Earlier, during the ongoing dispute with China over the Line of Actual Control, India had also directly purchased 1.44 lakh SIG Sauer rifles from the US under emergency procurement. However, the SIG Sauer rifles were procured for the Indian Army and have been used by the Indian Army. Indian soldiers deployed on both the LOC and LAC fronts are using these rifles.