Need Adequate Funding

Owing to complexities of the Defence Procurement Procedure and paucity of funds, the list of assets required by the IAF to replace those approaching obsolescence, has only been growing.

- Air Marshal B.K. Pandey (RETD)

PRESENTATION OF THE NATIONAL BUDGET FOR THE FINANCIAL year 2018-19 by the Minister of Finance, Arun Jaitley, on February 1 this year, has certainly generated a wave of concern across the board in the Indian armed forces. This adverse sentiment has been triggered by the quantum of funds allotted for defence, something that has been regarded by the leadership of all the three services as highly inadequate. The Indian armed forces were given the opportunity to present their perspective on the level of budgetary allocation for defence to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence, headed by Major General B.C. Khanduri (Retd), Member of Parliament from the BJP. To present the concerns of the Indian armed forces were the Vice Chiefs of the three services.

In an extremely frank and forthright manner, Lt General Sarath Chand, Vice Chief of the Army Staff, apprised the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence that “the allocation for defence in the budget for the year 2018-19 was in fact, a setback for the Indian Army as the quantum of funds sanctioned by the government under the head for procurement of new weapon systems, was not sufficient even to pay for ongoing projects and barely left anything for new procurements”. He went on to state that the budgetary allocation for the Indian Army had dashed hopes of the service for making any tangible or meaningful progress in the drive towards modernisation.