INS Kavaratti: Why time, cost overruns are endemic to warship projects

Indigenously built warfare corvette set to be commissioned

When Chief of Army Staff, General Manoj Mukund Naravane, commissions Indian Naval Ship (INS) Kavaratti in Visakhapatnam on Thusday, it will mark the end of Project 28 – one of the Indian Navy’s most ambitious, most delayed and most budget-busting warship projects.

Project 28, which envisioned building four indigenous anti-submarine corvettes at Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers, Kolkata (GRSE), will end four years later than planned. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) approved it in 2003 and the first corvette was to be delivered in 2012, with the other three following at one-year intervals.

Project 28 has also overshot its budget by