After 35 years of troubled development, India’s indigenously-designed Arjun tank has finally entered regimental service with the Indian Army. The development marks the fruition of 35 years of research in self-reliance by dedicated Indian scientists against all odds. Initially, 12 prototypes were developed during 1983 to 1990 and they were subjected to field trials of more than 20,000 kms and 1100 rounds. Based on user feedback 15 pre-production vehicles were developed during 1990 to 1995 and they were subjected to field trials of more than 70,000 kms and 8,000 rounds. DRDO will be incorporating all these inputs in the next regiment of 62 tanks for handing over to Army before March 2010 as desired by the Army. The regiment of 45 tanks will be subjected to a conversion training and field practice for a period of 3 months. Thereafter, the Army is planning to conduct a comparative trial with T-90 tanks in Oct/Nov 2009 to assess the operational deployment role of the tanks. The present batch of 124 tanks will be delivered by Mar 2010.