China and India have both decided to expand their navies by building their own aircraft carriers. Both nations began by refurbishing Russian carriers before designing and building their own. China was able to refurbish the former Russian carrier it purchased and learned a lot while turning an unfinished Kuznetsov class carrier, the Varyag, into the Type 001 carrier Liaoning (CV-16).
India did not have the resources to do the refurbishing so they hired Russian firms to do the job. That was a disaster. The 45,000 ton Vikramaditya was originally a Russian Kiev class carrier that served in the Russian Navy from 1987 to 1995 but was then withdrawn from service because Russia could not afford to keep the carrier operational. The ship was put up for sale in 1996 and in 2005. India agreed to buy it if a few changes could be made. India ended up paying over $2.3 billion to refurbish the Kiev class ship and turn it into the Vikramaditya, which entered service in 2014.
