INS Viraat to finally give Andhra Pradesh, Visakhapatnam the miss

VISAKHAPATNAM: The state government may not be able to turn Indian Navy’s oldest warship INS Viraat into a museum due to the high cost of the proposed project.

Sources said the project is estimated to cost around Rs 1,000 crore.

Despite chief minister Chandrababu Naidu’s interest in the project, there has been no official progress in bringing INS Viraat to Vizag.

“There is no official talks between the state and the Union defence ministry over the conversion of the decommissioned INS Viraat into a museum in Vizag city. As a result, we are working on some other project,” a senior rank officer confirmed to TOI.

Last year, the state had asked the Visakhapatnam Urban Development Authority (Vuda) to earmark at least 750 acres of land for the museum project. “We examined land parcels at Bheemili and

Yarada Beach

nearly six months earlier. There has not been any confirmation from the state till now. The government seems to be worried about the huge project cost,” a Vuda official said.

Plans were proposed to turn INS Viraat into a floating hotel on the lines of Lake Palace, a hotel in Udaipur, Rajasthan.

Sources from the defence wing said the Indian Navy had itself proposed to convert INS Viraat into an underwater marine museum for sea divers. The Indian Navy is searching for major tourist harbours for the marine museum project. If the plans fail, the ship will be sent to the scrapyard at Alang in Gujarat and sold as scrap, the sources said.