Two things that Prime Minister Narendra Modi said while commissioning India’s biggest indigenously-built warship INS Kolkata on Saturday are incontrovertible. The first, that deterrence is the best possible defence, and second, that modernising the armed forces is vital to protecting our nation. He went further, saying India will shift from being the world’s biggest arms importer to exporting arms. That is hugely ambitious, and will need sustained work over decades.
Indigenisation, even making modern transport aircraft for troops and equipment in the private sector, is about eight years away. In the last three years, when India became the world’s biggest arms importer, the FDI inflow for defence production was only around $5 million. That may change given the FDI ceiling in defence has been raised to 49 per cent; but a lot still has to change, such as eliminating corruption in defence procurement.
While it’s a matter of pride that INS Kolkata is a multi-functional destroyer with advanced anti-ship surface-to-surface BrahMos missiles, our preparedness in weaponry and other hardware is still nascent. Only major investments by international firms, particularly from the US and Israel, may bring us to a stage where India can consider exporting defence equipment as the PM hopes. The roadmap has been laid out for one of the world’s largest defence spenders — the current year’s budget is Rs Modernising A2.29 lakh crore — in inviting foreign investment and knowhow. While the results may take a long time coming; the effort must begin from now.
