Arjun Tank

The Arjun is an Indian third-generation main battle tank developed for the Indian Army and produced by Armoured Vehicles Nigam Limited at the Heavy Vehicles Factory, entering service in 2004 after a lengthy development process. It is named after Arjuna, the archer-prince and protagonist of the Hindu epic the Mahabharata, and it carries a 120mm rifled gun capable of firing armor-piercing, high-explosive anti-tank and high-explosive squash-head rounds; the original Mark 1 version weighs 58.5 tonnes with a 1,400 horsepower engine, while the improved Mark 1A variant weighs about 68 tonnes with a 1,500 horsepower engine. Development stretched across decades amid delays and cost overruns before the tank reached Indian Army units, where it has been fielded primarily in the desert terrain of Rajasthan, the environment for which its firepower and protection were specifically optimized.