Army shys away from buying bofors gun

NEW DELHI: The Army has called for fresh international bid to acquire the 52-calibre 155 mm towed gun even after conducting four rounds of trial with three competitors, a move experts fear would delay the forces' modernisation programme.

Top military sources said fresh tenders would be a jolt to army's artillery modernisation programme as it would mean that it would take another six to eight years for the much-needed gun to be inducted into the army.

The 52-calibre 155 mm towed guns are capable of firing nuclear shell to a distance of up to 50 kilometres.

The three competitors are Denel of South Africa, Soltam of Israel and BAE-SWS Bofors system.

While infantry and armoured formation modernization drive in the army has been in full swing since 2001, artillery, a vital arm has seen no quantum leap in its fire power.

Though India has concluded a deal to acquire long range SMERCH multi-barrel rocket system, the deal has run into a log jam over pricing squabbles with Russians.

Under the artillery deal worth Rs 4000 crore at present price level, India was to acquire four hundred 155 mm L 52 towed guns off the shelf and manufacture thousand guns in the country under technology transfer, providing New Delhi first exposure to indigenous use of such technology.

In a related move, government has already refloated request for proposals (RFP) for acquiring 100 self-propelled and 180 wheeled 155 mm and 52-calibre guns. However, the time for both the bids have been extended twice for lack of response.

In the towed guns, army has already held four rounds of trials in 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2006 to check general staff qualitative requirements (GSQR) parameters in desert and high altitude conditions during NDA and present UPA regimes.

In response to army's RFP issued in 2001, three bidders Denel of South Africa, Soltam of Israel and BAE-SWS system took part in trials. The South African company which was blacklisted on allegations of pay off in another deal was not allowed to participate in third round of trials.

The BAE-SWS and Soltam continued to be evaluated in fresh trials in 2004 and 2006.

After the fourth round of trial, Soltam was asked to take back its guns as it had failed to meet GSQR parameters. BAE-SWS system was asked to keep their guns in India and its guns were moved from Chandigarh to field artillery unit in Gurgaon near New Delhi.

The government move to go in for fresh international tenders comes at a time when the artillery fire power in the army is dipping in the absence of induction of longer range powerful guns.

Eight army regiments are having Bofors 155 mm .39 calibre guns and assortment of Russian 130 mm and 105 mm light mountain guns.

To overcome critical shortages, army has gone in for upgrading the World War II Russian 130 mm guns with expertise from Soltam instead of upgunning the 1989 Swedish acquired 155 mm L 39 calibre Bofors guns.

Though initially only 100 Russian guns were aimed to be upgraded, the order has now been expanded to almost 500 guns at an estimated cost of over Rs 800 crore.

The upgraded guns, artillery officers complained, cannot achieve more than 45 degree firing angle making them unfits for operations in the mountains.

With the reopening of the tenders army would lose the benefits of procuring these towed guns at price levels of 2002-2003 which would be in the range of Rs 10-12 crore per gun as against the current price level of approximately Rs 25-30 crore per gun.

The French aviation giant Dassault had offered India to transfer the entire assembly lines of the Mirage 2000in 2002, which was  received by the Ministry of Defence and ultimately which has now let India to float its biggest ever international defence tenders at an estimated Rs 40,000 crores for purchase of 126 multi-role combat aircraft.