Efforts are on to set up a force consisting of sophisticated fast attack craft and coastal surveillance aircraft. The Indian Navy's new Super Dvora Extra Fast Attack Craft (XFAC) commissioned at the naval dockyard today is the first component of a set piece designed for countering insurgency along the country's western coastline.

``The Navy should consist of blue water capability with large warships, but it cannot ignore what is happening in our backyard,'' Vice Admiral Madhvendra Singh pointed out while commissioning the Israeli-built T-80.``In the insurgency business, numbers matter,'' Admiral Singh later told newspersons adding that the Navy and the Coast Guard lack adequate forces to deal with the infiltrators and to fight them the Navy has ordered two Super Dvora crafts. The second Super Dvora craft is being builtat the Goa Shipyard Ltd and will be commissioned by the year end.

Built at a cost of Rs 19 crore, the 26-metre-long all aluminium craft is the smallest ship in the Navy. But with a speed of over 45 knots, it is also the fastest. ``It's like having a greyhound in the harbour,'' explains Vice Admiral Singh. Once the surveillance aircraft spots a suspicious vessel, the Dvora can zoom off from the harbour in hot pursuit of its quarry.

Besides a hydraulically stabilised 20 mm cannon, fly-by-wire controls and a unique propeller arrangement which enables it to operate in shallow water, the hi-tech craft features a TV camera with day and night vision, laser pointers and all weather capability. It was built by the Israelis to counter insurgency there.

The Navy currently operates five Dornier surveillance aircraft and is to induct six more such aircrafts. It is also shopping for sophisticated equipment like infra red night vision devices for surveillance and detection of intruders.

Successive intelligencereports have indicated that Maharashtra and Gujarat State, with a coastline of 750 and 1,600 km respectively, are extremely vulnerable to arms and explosives infiltration.

The landing of arms and RDX off Mumbai in 1993 prompted the Navy to launch Operation Swan to tackle intruders. Two years later, it also floated a qualitative requirement (QR) for a small high speed craft for intercepting infiltrators. Goa Shipyard Limited and Israel Aircraft Industries were chosen as the winning team.

``This is the first of the Super Dvoras built to Lloyds specifications with a re-designed bridge and other systems specifically ordered by our Navy,'' said Rear Admiral B R Menon (Retd), CMD of Goa Shipyard. He said that GSL had received export-related queries for the Dvora from several Far Eastern and African countries. Commanded by Lieutenant Srinivas Maddula, the T-80 has a complement of two officers and seven men.