A patient lying on a surgical table is told by the surgeon that he is going to open his tummy with a blunt knife. The patient is aghast and asks why? The Doctor says because it is made in India.
"Made in India" only means of comparable quality if not better and comparable price if not cheaper. Otherwise made in India has no meaning.
So Hospital Orders 2000$ costing knives from US of A instead of working/complaining with vendors to sharpen the knives. The US of A ships "handles" of knives as part of first shipment of CKD. Later India declares Students with US medical degree need to retake exam in India to work as practitioner. In protest US stops the 2nd shipment of blades. Now hospital is without blades and only has handle. They have refused to work with Indian vendor and now scouting for new set of knives from France and Russia who are now quoting 8000$ each piece.
Most of the arms industry worldover makes products mainly to sell in international markets even if their own Armed Forces do not require it. The case so far for India is that we are trying to make for us and for our defence. Hence, the opportunities for any Industry to work on "iteration" model means we accepting substandards for our own security. "improvement in future" is good for producers but bad for user and the govt who have to foot the bill out of very limited resources and can not cater for frequent replacements.
No No... Many examples on the contrary..
KC 390 vs Airbus 330 MRTT
F 16 - vs Japanese F -2
Russian Sukhoi 30 MKI vs Indian Sukhoi 30 MKI
etc
Nations have chosen expensive often less capable indigenous examples - if that meant building local capacity. Remember first of products will always be costly because they carry cost of R&D. Once that cost has been recovered, cost goes down or you can get fabulous discounts. The problem with Indian Army or Military, they manytimes behave like a spoilt child who insists on eating 200 Rs Spinach Subway wrap because it saw advt mentioning them as healthy over Ghar da saron da saag , methi paneer palak!
I like Navy for that, they are good task masters with intense focus on getting things done from DRDO and other PSU's while themselves being in driver seat. India's responsibilities and Challenges are growing and correspondingly its military needs are growing. Indian Army cannot depend on adhoc imports alone, you will need to take indigenization big way. Dont like DRDO, formulate your own Design agency. Tie up with Private sector for productionizing it.
Iteration is REALITY. Be it Defence or Private sector. The Phones that you use have many bug built in H/W or S/W which gets ironed out with each iteration. Same with weapons. There exist no perfect weapon, constant tweaking of weapon design goes on. Army needs to be smart and far sighted. They need short term , medium term and long term goals and they should be so good that they STICK to it.
I understand DRDO has not been able to come products -- affectingly sabotaging army procurement from elsewhere. This is where Govt needs to step in. Instead of doing hazily defined / unending R&D on exotic stuff/concept. They should simply introduce sprint cycles, with each sprint giving what user wants. This way they can early on identify whether they have capability to deliver in short period or it will take time. If its latter - let army import.
No. If Army asked them for 18 ton gun and now want to reduce the weight then it is fine. But if they themselves have presented 18 ton gun and Army wants 14 ton guns then it is manufacturers problem to reduce the weight for their guns to be accepted. Why should Army pay for that. It simply is a competitive bidding that would finally decide the issue.
Simply for reasons mentioned earlier. They are not selling you model which is already in production. They are selling you first iteration of Product, they need the R&D cost to be amortized. Indian ARmy will have huge benefit - they will get very cheap & reliable maintenance deal. Moreover, Army will have complete control on further modification.
Please do understand ATAGS is indigenous gun - you/India will own IP. Which will not be case with other Guns which will be mere Screwdriver giri. Gun Barrel Tech is closely guarded tech. No one easily shares. India is luck to have compaines like Kalyani who spent their own mOney in Buying Gun tech from US Company and developed its own ULH. Mind you there also bidding for US Contracts. Hope its not repeat of TONBO story
No sir. The GoI business must be conducted as per laid down rules. The Financial rules of the day say that the business must be conducted under financial benefits to the govt clause on L1. Financial prudence is the principle of govt financial transactions and should not be overlooked for the sake of expensive "made in India" .
Well if I am not wrong new defence policy prioritizes Designed and Made in India over Others
That is why single vendor situation and monopolistic practices are required to be avoided. There are many others in the fray. Kalyani themselves are manufacturing Rafael ATHOS, Then there TATA POWER version of ATAGS, then there is OFB version of 155/152 version of Dhanus and Nexter - all to be manufactured in India. Hence, DRDO / Kalyani should not be allowed to dictate terms. There is no Dalal or Dalali in that.
Tata Power, Kalyani are both liaising with DRDO for product ionizing ATAGS. Infact Kalyani supplies Barrelsto Tata Power ATAGS. Kalyani version has autoloader - Tata seems to be still working on it. Thats why contract got delayed IIRC reading from an old article sometime back
India today is maintaining more than ten lakh armed men and women under CAPF. On their recruitment why cannot they be send to Army for five years service ? Then they go to their respective CAPF and retie on completion of service with retirement liability on MHA as existing today. That will make CAPF constable much better trained, maintain young soldiers and officers profile in the Army and India will have a vast resrve of military trained manpower. Consider Army will have two to three lakh less pensioners every year. That will vastly take care of pensionary liability.
Agree whole heartedly - But Netas and babus fear Military becoming too big for its own shoes like in Pakistan - So doubt it will be ever done in peace time.
Army's pensionary problems is India's mismanagement problems and many ways exist to sort it out rather than targeting wounded soldiers pension - a matter of shame for current dispensation......
Agree, they have been wasting money on Minority scholarships and Sick PSU's. Money could have been spent elsewhere
Will count on your words!
