India To Deploy 16 Predator Drones On China Border? Here's What The Navy Chief Said

The Indian Navy Chief, Admiral R Hari Kumar stated that India will deploy 16 MQ-9B Predator drones on the land border, out of the total 31 drones being bought from the United States.

The Navy Chief was giving an interview to ANI as part of an attempt to attract youth from Ladakh and the Northeastern states to join the Navy.

"Out of the 31, about 16 of them will be primarily for the border areas, for the land region. The only difference between the sky guardian and the sea guardian is mainly the sensors," the Navy Chief said.

Regarding the surveillance capabilities of the MQ-9B drones, Admiral Kumar said, "The sensors of the predators are state-of-the-art and they provide good reconnaissance and intelligence capabilities."

"They will be able to provide near real-time and almost 24/7 surveillance," the Navy Chief added.

The Navy has already been operating two MQ-9Bs on lease from US-based General Atomics-Aeronautical Systems Inc since mid-2020, following the clash in the Galwan Valley of eastern Ladakh.

The Navy is highly impressed with the capabilities of the drone, so much so that the two MQ-9Bs completed 10,000 hours of flying in just two years.

"The P-8I have been used along with the Indian Army and the Indian Air Force teams and we found it quite beneficial. And similarly, we found that the two sea guardians which we have on lease are being operated since November 2020, are also been quite useful," the Chief said.

Even the Indian Army utilised the drone's real-time imagery capabilities, when the Navy’s drones were deployed along the line of actual control, to keep an eye on Chinese deployment.

The Navy will also extend the lease of the two drones already in operation.

Moreover, the two drones have currently completed more than 12,000 hours of incident free flying, up from the earlier reported 10,000 hours.