INS Arihant, India’s first nuclear armed submarine is now ready for full fledged operations. The submarine has passed several deep sea diving drills as well as weapons launch tests over the past five months. The formal induction into the naval fleet is only a political call away. The Arihant, which is the first of five nuclear missile submarines or SSBNs planned for induction, has also undergone deep sea dives off Vishakhapatnam where it was build. A Russian diving support ship – the RFS Epron that arrived on October 1 – has been accompanying the Arihant on its deep sea dives and launch tests.

Source Economic Times

INS Arihant

• INS Arihant (meaning “Slayer of Enemies”) is the lead ship of India’s Arihant class ofnuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines.
• The 6,000 tonne vessel was built under the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) project at the Ship Building Centre in the port city of Visakhapatnam.
• Arihant was launched on 26 July 2009, the anniversary of Vijay Diwas (Kargil War Victory Day) by the then Prime Minister of India, Dr Manmohan Singh.
• Arihant has four vertical launch tubes, which can carry 12 (three per launch tube) smaller K-15 missiles or four larger K-4 missiles. The K-4 has a longer range of 3,500 km (2,200 mi) and has commenced trials.
• On 25 November 2015, a dummy or unarmed Sagarika missile was successfully test fired from Arihant.