India and Sri Lanka enjoy strong defence relationship
Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, Santosh Jha visited INS Karanj, a Kalvari-class submarine and interacted with its crew members on Saturday after it made its port call at Colombo.

“INS Karanj welcomed in Colombo by the Sri Lanka navy on its first foreign port call for operational turnaround. High Commissioner visited the Kalvari-class submarine yesterday & interacted with the crew. 100 Sri Lanka navy personnel visited onboard for familiarisation briefing,” the Indian High Commission to Sri Lanka said in a post on X on Sunday.
 
INS Karanj, a 67.5 metres long submarine with a crew of 53, is under the command of Commander Arunabh, the Sri Lanka Navy said.
 
India and Sri Lanka enjoy a growing defence relationship built on extensive training and service-to-service linkages. The commonality of concerns of both countries, including with respect to the safety and security of their sea lanes of communication, informs their bilateral exchanges in this field, the Ministry of External Affairs said.
 
Indian and Sri Lankan navies regularly conduct maritime exercises in the Indian Ocean with an aim to enhance interoperability, improve mutual understanding and exchange best practices.
 
Earlier in September, INS Delhi, a guided missile destroyer embarked on a two-day visit to the Colombo Port. The objective behind INS Delhi’s visit to the Sri Lankan port was to strengthen navy-to-navy relations between the two countries.
 
In April 2023, navies of the two countries conducted the 10th edition of annual maritime exercise, SLINEX-2023, off Colombo. In this exercise, while the Indian Navy was represented by INS Kiltan (advance anti-submarine warfare corvette) and INS Savitri (offshore patrol vessel), the Sri Lankan Navy was represented by SLNS Gajabahu (advance offshore patrol vessel) and SLNS Sagara (offshore patrol vessel).
 
In addition, Indian Navy Chetak helicopter and Dornier Maritime Patrol Aircraft along with Sri Lanka Air Force Dornier and BELL 412 helicopters also participated in the Exercise. The maritime exercise also featured the Special Forces of the two Navies. The previous edition of SLINEX was conducted in Visakhapatnam from March 7-12, 2022.