The tank, designed, developed, and manufactured by the Defence Research and Development Organisation's Combat Vehicles Research and Development Establishment and made in Tamil Nadu, will be used to protect northern borders.
An army jawan was killed and two others were injured when a Combat Battle Tank hit a building during testing inside a Defence Research and Development Organisation lab in the city.
Of the total 124, CVRDE had already delivered 29 MBTs in two instalments till March this year. Rest of the Arjun tanks would be delivered by March 2010, Pillai said.
Sources said of the 13,700 crore, Rs 8,300 crore will be for procuring 118 Arjun (Mk-1A).
The defence ministry on Thursday sealed a contract to procure 118 main battle tanks Arjun for the Indian Army at a cost of Rs 7,523 crore, in a major move to boost its combat capabilities.
India has over 4,000 medium tanks, but not a single light tank. It remains to be seen whether the Ladakh face-off with China galvanises a change, observes Ajai Shukla.
From tackling cyber threat to having an an unmanned tank, there's so much DRDO wants to do
For some inexplicable reason, the army prefers to use Russian armour; Arjun is deployed in only two of its 63 armoured regiments.
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