On the other hand our forces are not even spending budget allocated to them.
Look at this :
Union Budget 2022: The low spending of the defence budget comes as an aberration because the services are learnt to have projected the requirement for capital budgets way higher than they were allocated.
www.news18.com
Navy has spent 90% of capital outlay.
Airforce has spent 70% of capital outlay.
Army has spent only 40% of capital outlay.
On top of that army "sources" are complaining that this is due to restriction on buying foreign equipment.
Defence funds should not lapse with the ending of the financial year and any unspent money should be carried forward to next year. That said the money allocated should be usefully spent. Since the requirements are vast.
No excuses. But maybe the Covid 19 situation delayed decision making.
There are a lot of things that can be improved in the defence apparatus. Many weaknesses and short comings. But I think that we are slowly increasing the efficiency of decision making in defence if we compare the present situation with the one prevailing a few decades ago. Also we have more money to spend on defence. So situation is not entirely bleak.
I believe our defence R&D and even production is attaining an momentum which cannot be stopped. So even if we suffer from some setbacks in some areas the larger picture is positive.
We have or in the process of developing mk2, mk3 etc versions of most weapons. Whether it is the Akash mk2/NG or Astra mk2 and mk3 most weapons are seeing newer iterations being developed. Technology is being refined and improved.
Inspite of bumbling and fumbling we are steadily climbing the curve as far as defense technologies are concerned. And the Government has realised that the Indian private sector is really Indian and can be trusted with defence manufacturing. Not an pariah. Both the public and the private sector need to perform strongly if we want to reach full self sufficiency.
Hope this new year will see a lot of breakthroughs in our defence development.