Arms imports up, must be curbed: House panel

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 21

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence, in its report tabled in the House today, said the value of imported arms and equipment had been constantly increasing since 2017-18.

The committee recommended the Ministry of Defence to come up with ways and means not only to reduce imports, but also bolster indigenous products for exports.

It took note of the data that suggests 84.3 per cent of the major conventional arms procured by India between 2016 and 2020 were of foreign origin, of which licensed production accounted for 57.8 per cent, which evidently reflects high dependency of armed forces on foreign sources.

“We believe that this dependency needs to be curtailed by incentivising indigenisation more vigorously,” the committee said.

Since the 2017-18 financial year, 264 capital acquisition contracts have been signed for the capital procurement of defence equipment for the armed forces. Of these, 88 have been signed with vendors from foreign countries, including Russia, USA, Israel and France, it said.