The INSAS 5.56mm Rifle

Steve Johnson
by Steve Johnson

An Indian reader emailed me an article he wrote about India’s service weapon, the INSAS 5.56mm Rifle. The article is facinating and I highly recommend you take the time to read it.

INSAS receiver. Note the lettering: its been scratched in my hand.

I think it is safe to say the gun was designed by a committee. It has a FNC-styled fore-end, a AK-styled receiver, a FNC-styled trigger group, an AK-style bolt/gas system and Steyr AUG inspired magazines (which are manufactured by an Indian plastic furniture maker!)!

I found quite saddening was the obvious lack of pride by the workers at the Ishapore factory. One of the rifles which the author inspected did not even bother wiping off the white enamel paint which is used to color the lettering. I have not met any workers from Colt Defense’s M4 factory, but I would imagine they take great pride in knowing that their work is used to defend the nation. The author wrote …

I found out that they wanted to have white paint filled lettering, but the crude scratching that passed off as lettering was too shallow and the lazy buggers at the factory simply squished some white enamel over the general areas and didn’t even bother to wipe off the excess!!

Read the article here.

Steve Johnson
Steve Johnson

I founded TFB in 2007 and over 10 years worked tirelessly, with the help of my team, to build it up into the largest gun blog online. I retired as Editor in Chief in 2017. During my decade at TFB I was fortunate to work with the most amazing talented writers and genuinely good people!

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  • Flashman Flashman on Aug 18, 2010

    What a piece of junk! It's hard to believe that any army would equip its troops with such trash.

    My shilling says that a goodly slice of the development budget went into the the trough and was speedily vacuumed up by a legion of Mr Fix-its, politicians, their relatives and assorted other influence peddlers and consultants.

  • Justin Liu Justin Liu on Aug 19, 2010

    @Flashman Swiss banks reports there are about 1.5 trillion dollars of indian money in their accounts. This is 3 times the nearest russian amount. No doubt some of that money comes from skimming from arms development

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