When does a nation stop asking for a seat at the table and start building the table itself? Prime Minister Narendra Modi has answered this question. For over a decade, he has pursued a singular, unwavering strategy: transforming India’s navy into the instrument through which the nation will claim its place as a true superpower—not through incremental defence procurement, but as a civilisational ambition expressed through maritime power.

History teaches us an unyielding lesson. Every global superpower, Spain during the Inquisition, Britain at its imperial apex, America in the modern era, built its dominion first upon the waves. The Spanish Armada, the Royal Navy that patrolled every ocean, the American carrier battle groups that project force across continents: each represents the capability and the sovereignty to shape world events.

Modi understands this: you cannot lead without the ability to enforce that leadership. You cannot be a superpower in a multipolar Indo-Pacific without controlling the seas through which 80 per cent of global seaborne oil flows.

Transformation At Speed

And the Prime Minister has ensured that this understanding has been translated into reality. Indian shipyards have delivered 40 warships over the last 11 years, with 51 large ships currently under construction in the country. In the previous year, a new vessel was inducted, on average, every 40 days. Let that number sink in.

In January 2025, Modi presided over a tri-commissioning that would have been unimaginable ten years earlier: a destroyer, a frigate, and a submarine simultaneously joining the fleet, each built entirely within India—INS Surat, INS Nilgiri and INS Vaghsheer. Each of them was designed and built domestically, using at least 75 per cent indigenous components.

But even this is not the most significant milestone Indian shipyards have achieved. INS Vikrant, commissioned in September 2022, India’s indigenous aircraft carrier, is the cream of the crop, the crème de la crème, the jewel of the Indian Navy.

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