India Navy INS Samarthak Commissioned

INS Samarthak was commissioned at Naval Base Karwar, Karnataka, on 16 October 2026, in a ceremony presided over by the Vice President of India and attended by the Chief of the Naval Staff. Delivered by Larsen & Toubro in August, she is the first of two Multi-Purpose Vessels ordered in March 2022 and built at the company's Kattupalli shipyard. Designed primarily for maritime surveillance and patrol, the ship also serves as a trials platform for indigenous weapons and sensors, a mothership for unmanned systems, a target-deployment vessel and a disaster-relief ship with limited hospital capability.