Last Wednesday, Republic Day (R-Day) was solemnly celebrated in India. A large-scale military parade was held in New Delhi, where various samples of military equipment, including historical ones, were demonstrated.
Several combat vehicles, especially distinguished during various wars and conflicts in which the armed forces of this state took part, were transported on trailers behind Tatra 815 tractors.
The PT-76 received the honorary right to lead a column of rare equipment. These light Soviet tanks began their career in the Indian Ground forces in the late summer of 1965. Already in the autumn they had to take part in the fighting for the first time.
However, the "seventy-sixers" especially distinguished themselves during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971, when they had to fight not only with the American-made M24 Chaffee, but also destroy enemy gunboats.
The British Centurion followed the PT-76. It is known that such tanks successfully destroyed the M47 Patton II and M48 Patton III purchased in the USA during the Battle of Asal Uttar in the second Indo-Pakistani War in September 1965.
During the battle, in which the opposing sides involved almost four hundred tanks, the Pakistani army lost 97 pieces of equipment, most of them were destroyed by Centurion tanks, of which there were only 45 pieces.
The Indian side lost 32 tanks of all types, since in addition to the "British", outdated M4 and light French AMX-13 fought here.
The Czechoslovak tracked armored personnel carrier OT-62 TOPAS and the BMP-1 acquired in the Soviet Union were also demonstrated. The first, together with the BTR-50 and PT-76, managed to fight in 1971, and infantry fighting vehicles of the first generation were used during a peacekeeping operation in Sri Lanka.
Alexey Moiseev
