The MQ-9B 'hunter killer' drone.
Credit: X/@ANI
New Delhi: India on Tuesday inked a mega defence contract with the USA to procure 31 Predator drones at a cost of over Rs 32,000 crore (about $3.5 billion) through the government-to-government route, marking yet another show of New Delhi’s growing proximity to Washington.
The agreement, signed by defence officials from the two sides here, was realised a year after Prime Minister Narendra Modi made an official request to buy MQ9B unmanned aerial vehicle, manufactured by General Atomics, during his bilateral meeting with President Joe Biden in September last year.
The high-altitude, long-endurance fighter aircraft-sized remotely piloted aircraft will significantly boost the armed force’s ability for long-range stealth surveillance and precision strike over the horizon, sources said.
India becomes the first country outside the NATO block to have these UAVs that are being used by the USA and its allies. Japan, Belgium and the UK are the three countries outside the USA that use these UAVs.
The aircraft can fly at an elevation of 50,000 ft and stay in the air between 30-40 hours depending on the nature of the mission and the payload it carries. The aircraft is capable of carrying four Hellfire missiles and 450 kg of bombs.
In 2020, the Indian Navy had taken on lease two MQ-9B Sea Guardian drones from General Atomics for surveillance in the Indian Ocean. Later these platforms were used to monitor Chinese activities in eastern Ladakh.
Once the delivery starts, the Indian Navy will receive 15 of these remotely piloted aircraft while the remaining 16 will be divided equally between the Indian Army and IAF. They will be inducted over the next four years.
The Predators were likely to be based at Arakkonam, Porbandar, Sarswa and Gorakhpur, sources said.
The Defence Ministry signed a second agreement with General Atomics Global India Pvt Ltd to set up a maintenance, repair and overhaul of these aircraft.
The agreement signing follows days after the Cabinet Committee on Security’s approval for the long awaited deal last week.
“These platforms will enhance the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities of India’s armed forces across all domains,” the White House had stated in a statement last year after the Modi-Biden summit meeting.
While New Delhi will primarily be using these aircraft for surveillance, one of the variants of the MQ-9B drone (MQ-9 Reaper) was used by the US forces to launch a modified Hellfire missile that eliminated al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in the heart of Kabul in July 2022.