DNA Edit: Army needs firepower

Home Minister Rajnath Singh​, while addressing a political rally in Tripura last week​, said that the Indian Army has been ordered to fire countless bullets in retaliation for a single bullet fired by Pakistan. That the BJP government is lending unstinting support to the ​Army is heartening to see, however, without a comprehensive action plan to strengthen the many infirmities of the Army, this comment is, at best, political tokenism.

Consider a factoid that is not reported often: In the last 20 years, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has completely utilised the allocations thrice. Underlying this misadventure is the failure to communicate between the Ministry of Finance (MoF) and the MoD. Both the ministries have been on the receiving end of the ire of the Standing Committee, which has criticised them for passing the buck on instituting reforms, delays in arms acquisitions and for poor inter-ministerial communication. The report of the Standing Committee shows how both the ministries have indulged more in blame game rather than resolving the issues at hand.

For instance, on ​Budget allocations, the MoD explained to the Standing Committee that it had taken up the “matter of reduced allocations with the MoF, but no positive outcome was received”. Shrugging off the liability, the MoF responded that the slow pace of expenditure by the MoD was the prime cause behind the MoF cutting back on allocations. On the recurrent underspending, the MoD as per the Committee report, conveniently, blames the MoF for underspending citing that there were many proposals pending with the ministry for approvals. On the delays in acquisitions, the Standing Committee skewered the MoD for finger pointing at the MoF or at the manufacturer or vendor for the hold up in delivery of equipment.

In the end, the Standing Committee concluded that the underutilisation of allocated funds indicated that many of the “institutional mechanisms put in place for financial planning and monitoring utilisation of funds is not effective”. A possible way out from this imbroglio could be the appointment of an independent regulator, an idea that was originally mooted in the Strategic Partnership Policy.

Sadly, the mention of this regulator has been skipped in the Defence Procurement Policy 2016, which means that defence acquisition will continue to be marked with protracted deferrals. Had the position of an independent regulator been etched out in the extant defence ecosystem, divergent interests of the MoF, MoD, armed forces and private participants would have been brought on the same page to facilitate expedited ammunition delivery for the forces.

Meanwhile, India has to prepare itself for the prospects of a war on two and a half fronts​ ​– Pakistan, China and internal dissension by the Maoists. Such war-preparedness seems next to impossible if the weapons procurement remains mired in long-winded procurement procedures, where major procurement procedures end up taking seven to ten years.