Tag Archives: overseas gun orders

India Orders Another 73,000 SIG 716 Rifles

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New Hampshire-based SIG Sauer announced this week the company has pulled down a second significant contract to supply the second-largest standing army in the world with rifles.

The award, from the Government of India’s Ministry of Defence, is to supply an additional 73,000 SIG 716 rifles to that country’s military. When completed, 145,400 SIG716 rifles will be in service with the Indian Army.

In early 2019, purchased 72,400 of the rifles, chambered in 7.62 NATO. The lion’s share of these – some 66,400 – went to the Indian Army, while the balance went to the Air Force and Navy. The move came about as the Indian Army, which fields more than 1.2 million active troops, was undergoing a comprehensive firearms procurement process to advance the capabilities of the country’s infantrymen while facing increased threats from neighboring China.

More in my column at Guns.com.

India’s new FAL?

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Since 1960, India’s state-owned Ordnance Factories Board has produced a domestic variant of the British L1A1 inch-pattern semi-auto-only FN FAL, dubbed the Ishapore 1A1. Keep in mind most of the other Commonwealth countries at the time to include Australia, Canada, and New Zealand ran the L1A1 as well.

The FAL had a universal adaptor in the Free World in the 1960s-80s

With as many as 1 million of these 7.62 NATO battle rifles produced, the OFB slowed production in the 1980s and finally closed down the line in 2012 in favor of imported AKM variants from around the globe and locally-made FAL-like INSAS 5.56 NATO rifles, the latter of which had a poor reputation.

However, with India increasingly facing Pakistan and China on its borders in mountainous regions that favor longer-ranged rifles, the country has been looking for a modern 7.62 NATO battle rifle and seems to have found it in the SIG 716. Like the FAL, it is a short-stroke gas piston gun. Unlike the old “Right Arm of the Free World,” however, it is slathered in M-LOK accessory slots, has an adjustable Magpul PLS stock, is a flat-top design that readily supports optics and, most importantly, is in standard production.

India ordered 72,000 last year and just announced plans to pick up another 72,000 this year.

More in my column at Guns.com