DRDO BETS BIG ON INDI GENOUS CAPABILITIES

India should focus more on indigenous defence production to reduce import in the defence sector, and to become self-reliant in technology.

- Manish Kumar Jha

THE GOVERNMENT aims to take the Indian economy to $10 trillion by 2030, and it believes, defence is one of the sectors that can help in contributing towards this. Echoing the same views, the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is working towards the same to make this a reality. With a network of 52 laboratories across the country and over 30,000 employees, it is one of India’s largest and most diverse research organisations.

Controlled directly by the Ministry of Defence, DRDO feels the country should focus on more indigenous defence production to reduce import in the sector and should become self-reliant in technology. But the approach towards indigenisation since independence has yielded limited results. It has largely resulted in policy capture by public sector undertakings in the name of indigenisation. The net result is that the domestic industry is incapable of meeting India’s defence requirements and is embroiled in license production as far as the key technology is concerned.

The Breakthrough

It would be unfair to deride the institution without talking about their breakthroughs, and in fact, the best in the world of science and technology, in some of complex technological challenges of the 21st century. Especially in Defence, the assimilation of such breakthrough in forming into the workable application is another crucial thread that scientists have to grapple with. For such breakthroughs, it is also a fact that the DRDO has not received the emphatic applause from the various corners that it actually deserves.