‘Russia-Ukraine war affected availability of def equipment’

Kolkata: The Russia-Ukraine war has had a detrimental effect on the availability of the defence equipment that is held by the Indian Armed Forces which in turn has affected the functions that keep the security of the country at an optimum level, said Vice Admiral Sanjay Mahindru, Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff, Indian Navy.

Speaking at a CII naval aviation seminar in Kolkata, he highlighted the need for developing indigenised defence equipment. Referring to the Russia-Ukraine war, he said: “With the outbreak of special operations by the Russian Federation, things have been going south for us given the large amount of Russian equipment that we had, be it the Indian Army, Indian Navy or the Indian Air Force. It has had a detrimental effect on the availability of equipment that we hold. Many critical programs that are vital for our normal day-to-day functioning to keep the security of the country at optimal levels have been hampered or delayed by this unprecedented situation.” “The imposition of financial sanctions by the United States and European Union, on the Russians, have further aggravated the problem,” he added.

Stressing the need for country-made equipment, he highlighted: “Being one of the largest defence importers in the world, the government and the armed forces have realised the fact that we need to eventually get out of this system of defence procurement from external sources.”

The Vice Admiral said that the Indian Navy has always been at the forefront of the indigenisation programme for decades. “We are on the verge of aircraft building, both rotary and fixed-wing aircraft. The indigenisation efforts will now need to shift more towards weapons and sensors,” he pointed out but cautioned: “Stopping of defence import abruptly will however not solve the problem. It needs a lot of discussions. Enough funds need to be put into defence development and research.” Nidhi Bansal, scientist and director of Technology Development Fund, DRDO, highlighted: “On March 31, DRDO got a case cleared from the Ministry of Defence which will now allow us to issue ‘Fit for Military Use’ certificates to all the development agencies and industry partners if they have had their prototypes of defence equipment successfully developed.”

She said that if a war is to be fought in the future by our armed forces, it is not just important but vital that such war is fought with indigenous technology. The armed forces need to be in complete control of the war machines, be it the hardware or software, for the entire life cycle of that war machine, she pointed out. “DRDO has been helping our industry partners with the best domain experts so they can build the best equipment. Users are also constantly kept in the loop for the entire process of developing the defence equipment to its testing, etc” she said.