The undue delay in defence procurements has resulted in serious erosion in the operational capability of the Indian armed forces raising serious doubts about their capability to fight a war even on a single front, leave alone fighting a twofront war.

A MiG-21 aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) crashed in Jammu and Kashmir on May 27, 2014, killing the pilot. The accident in which a fighter pilot lost his life, is indeed both tragic and traumatic. However, the fact that it took place a day after the new government assumed charge, ought to be regarded as a cruel but timely notice to the new dispensation of the rather disconcerting state of military hardware prevailing in the Indian armed forces in general and the IAF in particular. Like some other departments of the Central Government, during the last seven years, the Indian armed forces have suffered from policy paralysis and inaction on the part of the Ministry of Defence especially with regard to procurement of weapon systems.

The Indian Army has been struggling for several years to procure artillery guns that it desperately needs. However, for one reason or another, the global tender floated inviting bids has been cancelled five times. Efforts by the Army to acquire these through the Foreign Military Sales programme of the US Government, has also not succeeded as yet. The service is also reported to be afflicted by shortage of even basic weapons such as medium machine guns, rifles and carbines as also ammunition. The state of equipment in the Indian Navy is no better as has been clearly manifest in the series of accidents due to technical failure of ageing and life expired equipment resulting in heavy loss of life. The chain of catastrophes caused embarrassing turmoil in the higher echelons of leadership in the service leading to resignation by Admiral D.K. Joshi, the Chief of Naval Staff. But perhaps the worst affected among the three services has been the IAF.

Several aircraft types in the fleet of combat jets in the IAF are either obsolete or are rapidly approaching obsolescence. The strength of the fleet of combat jets today stands at 34 squadrons as against the revised authorised figure of 42. With the phasing of the older types in the fleet scheduled over the next three years, the strength could fall well below 30 squadrons. A global tender for the procurement of 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) was floated in 2007. However, even after a lapse of seven years, the contract is yet to be concluded even though the Rafale fielded by Dassault Aviation of France, was selected more than two years ago. Tender for 197 light utility helicopters for the Indian Army and the IAF to replace the ageing fleet of Cheetah and Chetak helicopters has been cancelled twice frustrating all efforts by the services to get the deal through. Procurement of 22 Boeing AH-64D Apache attack helicopters to replace the Russian MI-35s, 15 CH-47 Chinook twin-rotor heavy lift helicopters also from Boeing, to replace the Mi-26 fleet and six A330 flight refuelling aircraft from Airbus, have all been inordinately delayed. And of course there was the rather embarrassing case of cancellation of contract for VVIP helicopters from AgustaWestland halfway through execution. Apart from the subsequent legal complications in the case, this sordid episode has only served to dent the reputation of the nation in the global aerospace industry.

The entire procurement process in the last few years was vitiated with allegations of impropriety, investigations, cancellation of tenders/contracts and blacklisting of firms. The net effect of all this has been undue delay in defence procurements resulting in serious erosion in the operational capability of the Indian armed forces raising serious doubts about their capability to fight a war even on a single front, leave alone fighting a two-front war. However, there is hope that the decisive leadership of the new government will reenergise the procurement of defence equipment to build up military power to match the status of the nation as a regional power. In the final analysis, a nation aspiring for leadership in the region can only succeed if it is in a position to negotiate from a position of strength.