Antony asks for focused defence spending

With sluggish economy putting in limbo its demand for additional funds, the Defence Ministry on Wednesday asked the three services to have a more “focused” approach towards acquisition especially towards the critical projects and plans that have a direct bearing on their “operational preparedness”.

 

 

Many of the modernization projects – artillery and fighter jets procurement – is moving at a snail pace and the huge capital expenditure earmarked for the current fiscal remains largely unspent. The projections made by Antony in his reply during budget session in Rajya Sabha were found to be way off the mark in the review, sources revealed. 

The delay in Indigenous Aircraft carrier (IAC), slow progress of border roads projects in Arunachal, highly unsatisfactory progress of ordinance factories and defence PSUs are said to be the main reasons for the state of present affairs in the defence expenditure, sources said. To set right the course and exhaust the 1,93,000 crores of defence budget, out which around Rs. 80,000 crores were allocated for modernization and acquisition projects, Antony has asked the officials to conducts series of separate review meetings about the projects and plans having direct linkages with the “operational preparedness”. 

Earlier, the MoD had projected an additional budgetary requirement of Rs. 50,000 crore for the year 2012-13. During the budget announcement itself, Antony had made it known that the amount was 15.5 percent less than the estimated requirement of the services. Antony announced that as per projections his ministry needed Rs. 2,39,123 crores in total and thus they will require an additional amount of Rs 45,716 crores.

“The budget estimates were given in accordance with the assessment of the new emerging threat perception from neighbouring countries and the forces required it to meet the new challenges. However, with the other ministries facing cut, the defence ministry is afraid that the inability to finish the defence budget would lead to a cut in the next budget,” sources said.

In the ongoing financial year, the Defence Ministry is expected to conclude the largest open tenders to buy 126 medium multi-role fighter aircraft at an estimated value of Rs. 48,000 crore along with scores of other multi-billion dollar tenders for artillery, helicopters and warships reaching final stages. However, majority of these projects have been delayed due to slow acquisition processes and the losing vendors trying to put spoke in the process by citing irregularities in the deal.

In comparison to the defence budget of Rs.1.70 lakh crore in 2011-12, this year Indian defence budget was 13.15 percent higher at Rs 1.93 lakh crore, out of which Rs. 79, 579 crore was to be spent on purchase of new weapons and platforms.  The hike though considerable as per the Indian standards will be no match to the country’s eastern neighbor. China’s increased budget has continued to cause concern in India. According to Pentagon’s South Asian Defence and Strategic Year Book China’s total military spending has increased by 189 percent between 2001 and 2010, an average annual increase of 12.5 percent. As per data, China is the second largest spender of defence after the US and India comes at position 9.