When the Chinese incursions were reported at multiple locations in Eastern Ladakh in April 2020, it was an obvious deduction that the China problem is going to stay with reasonably higher chances of escalation. It is obvious that Chinese disregarded all bilateral agreements which resulted in Galwan clash wherein unarmed Indian soldiers were attacked by large size Chinese troops who were armed with fatal attack means just short of firing the bullet. The Galwan clash happened on 05 May 2010 and is a watershed moment in our bilateral relations.
While India had started ‘Make in India’ as early as in Sep 2014, Aatmnirbhar Bharat got formally launched on 13 May 2020 just within a week of Galwan clash. Though country has been working on self-reliance in the multiple domains since independence, the real focus has emerged now especially in the indigenisation of the equipment to be used by the defence forces, be it Army, Air force or Navy. Even if the formulation of Aatmnirbhar Bharat was in making for some time, its formal declaration immediately after Galwan clash does indicate the serious necessity of indigenization effort for the defence forces. In addition to China breathing down on LAC in Eastern Ladakh as well as other places including its manifestation in Yangtse in Arunachal Pradesh on 9 Dec22 , Russia-Ukraine conflict has exposed the chinks in Russian armour. At a time when our adversary, China is becoming increasingly belligerent, Indian nation cannot afford to have its majorly equipment ex import even if the same is from the friendly and trustworthy countries.
Multiple actions have been initiated by the Government to fast-track the indigenous production of the defence equipment be it for final products, their assemblies or sub components. Issue of four negative/positive lists have clearly indicated the details of items placed under import ban besides setting the timelines in which these have to be substituted by indigenous products. There are wide ranging initiatives in form of iDEX, Technology derp fund, R&D related fund allocation, fund support for prototyping of the product needed by the defence forces as part of Make1 category and list can be endless. There is increased transparency for vendor registration as well as requirement of buyers being stated to a reasonable extent. Despite all this, some major and important connecting dots appear to be missing. Some of these are covered below:
- Need of Defence Industrial Corridors in Gujrat and Maharashtra: Government has announced two defence industrial corridors, one in UP and the other in Tamil Nadu. While such efforts are key to growth of concerned states including additional opportunities for the employment, the country has to compress the timeframe for indigenisation. To make it happen, it has to focus on those regions which have larger and advanced industrial footprints. Industries in Gujrat as well as in Maharashtra are reasonably advanced. It can be understood from the fact that Rajkot in Gujrat alone is capable of producing almost all metallic products for our defence forces. While country can continue developing Defence Industrial Corridors in UP and Tamil Nadu as announced earlier, there is an urgent need to announce two more defence industrial corridors, one each in Gujrat and Maharashtra in the coming budget as the country has to collapse the anticipated production times in view of rising China challenge. There is no luxury of time on our part.
- Single Window Vendor Registration: Though vendor registration has been made ‘online’ in large Number of cases but still an Indian company needs to register as vendors with various organisations separately. This needs to be avoided. The better approach should be utilisation of GEM portal which must be mandatorily usable by all the defence buyers. Alternately, a separate portal of Department of Defence Production (DDP) could be offered for the purpose. This registration should be usable by all PSUs / DPSUs or other buyers. To make it successful and compliant, vendor registration practice with individual organisations should be done away with.
- Translation cell: There are various cells which have been created in the MOD to fast-track the indigenous defence production but there are large gaps at the manufacturers end to understand the actual need. A translation cell needs to be suitably composed which can explain the details of products in negative/positive lists to the potential manufactures who can see the items physically which need to be indigenized including making the product available for producing in a time bound manner. This translation cell also needs to state the details of technology needed by acting as a layer between the concept and the execution.
- Lack of Awareness: Despite proactivity of the Government and automation, these is large gap between the manufacturers and the defence buyers, be it DRDO entities, DPSUs or the users themselves. The country has the capacity to indigenous close to 50 percent in a year itself provided this gap is breached. The DDP portal could not only list items to be indigenised but also give the photographs alongwith the contact Number of potential buyer where the quantum of items needed can be also stated upfront. We should be able to predict our needs for a decade at least not only in terms of new equipment but also the MRO/ sustenance needs of legacy as well as current equipment.
- Need of Burying Whitehall System: While Britishers left India but Lord Whitehall had started a formal filing system which has kept our majority progress hostage to the ‘process’ and relegated the ‘product’ to secondary stage. It is a norm to follow the correct process even if it results in poor and delayed product but not the other way round. The current system has to be changed and better alternatives need to be adopted. Collegium system could be one such model .
And there are many more such actions which need to be taken by the Government of the day. The time gap between China Conflict cannot be taken as ‘substantial’ for our Capacity building. Even with above steps being adopted, there will be substantial changes in the indigenisation domain of the equipment of the defence forces. Once technology is explained, the new India will be borne not only taking care of own defence forces but also that of friendly foreign countries.
This article by the author has earlier been published in Financial Express
Kevin Desouza
I think we need to discern between what ‘must’ be done and what ‘can’ be done. The question to ask is why Self-reliance hasn’t been achieved till now and what exceptional capability has India now acquired that will enable us to do so?