Description
The Arjun is a third generation main battle tank developed for the Indian Army. This tank was developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation. It is an agency of the Republic of India, charged with the military's research and development, headquartered in New Delhi. This main battle tank entered service with the Indian Army in 2004.
The Arjun is equipped with an indigenously developed 120mm main rifled gun with fin stabilised armour-piercing discarding sabot. Secondary armament consists of coaxial 7.62-mm machine gun and roof-mounted 12.7-mm machine gun.
The turret and glacis are protected with "Kanchan" modular composite armour. Kanchan is made by sandwiching composite panels between Rolled Homogenous Armour. This helps in defeating APFDS and HEAT rounds. An option is also available to add explosive reactive armour.
The Arjun Mk II was developed in cooperation with Israeli defense companies. Its development was completed in 2 years owing to experience gained from developing the first version. It has outclassed the T-90 MBT during comparative trials.
