Firearms and ammunition: What most Indians got it wrong

Before we start this topic let us first understand the rules of gun safety.

1. All guns are always loaded.
2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy.
3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target.
4. Be sure of your target and what is beyond it.

In this post I wanna talk about the facts that how many Indians especially Mizo got the knowledge of firearms wrong. I came to know this when I was reviewing some Arms Licensing and the type of firearm they posses. And another fact is that the India Arms act refer to the glossary of firearms in the old fashioned way. Eg. The size of the barrel(diameter)  of a firearm today is referred in terms of caliber while Indian Arms Act refers in terms of bore. I want to talk about mostly the caliber and the the shotgun class especially.

For comparison I'm putting the image comparison of various cartridge

Left to right: 1 3 inch 12 ga magnum shotgun shell, 2 AA battery (for size comparison), 3 .454 Casull, 4 .45 Winchester Magnum, 5 .44 Remington Magnum, 6.357 Magnum, 7 .38 Special, 8 .45 ACP, 9 .38 Super, 10 9 mm Luger, 11 .32 ACP, 12 .22 LR

Shotgun:

A shotgun is a firearm that is usually designed to be fired from the shoulder, which uses the energy of a fixed shell to fire a number of small spherical pellets called shot, or a solid projectile called a slug.

For most Indians and Mizos, when the word shotgun came up, we thought the later as the pump action shotgun we noticed in movies but never as a break action shotgun which many Mizos possessed locally known as "Ulhbun". Through the history of firearms, there are  various types of shotgun from the old break-action to the latest fully automatic AA-12

Example  of Break-Action (Ulhbun)

These Break-Action types fire the same shells and must also be termed as shotgun..Never get this wrong. Pump action shotguns are those firearms that have the loading mechanism under the barrel and might have a tube magazine.

Mossberg Pump action

Mossberg Semi-Auto Shotgun

AA-12 Automatic shotgun

Misconceptions of caliber in the Indian Arms Licence

I recently came across a civilian bearer of a .357 Magnum Pistol. the .357 Magnum cartridge is considered to be the most powerful handgun in the world and that a .38 Special  caliber is prohibited in the Indian law. Check the image for comparison. The Indian Authorities got the figure all wrong as they let the numbers speak for themselves and not the ballistic and the muzzle velocity of the cartridge. The sheer size of the .357 Magnum is no match for the .38 Special in terms of ballistic, damage and range.

This shows that the licensing authority in the country should have a specific knowledge of the proper size and ballistic performance of various cartridge. Another fact I wanna speak out is the 9mm and the 7.62 Tokarev cartridge.

                                      Round comparison Left to Right:  7.65mm Browning, 7.62 Tokarev, 9mm Parabellum

As we see the 9mm is a very common firearm as all the law enforcement issue this in terms os FN Browning HP, Glock 17 etc. These firearms are prohibited under the law and thus civilians are banned from possessing one. the 7.62 Tokarev is of Russian origin and is a likely competitor for the 9mm and I see another civilian owner..Again the authority let the name of the number speak for itself again. By comparison in terms of ballistic, the 9mm has a more kinetic energy and impact power while the slim 7.62 Tokarev has a far greater range and accuracy.. 

These are few of the many facts that many civilians and authorities get the firearms wrong.. I will get back to more about firearms as soon as possible