1

The super power US and Russia intend to cater to all the defence requirements for India, and competing with each other with all might to win the contracts, be it missiles, helicopters or fighters. India remains its the guinea pig, as it does not intend really to become a major player in defence production. From scratch, India could build nuclear power stations of its own and bombs along with globally envied satellites for space launches by ISRO, but it could not produce the guns, tanks and fighters that could be accepted and used by its army and airforce. It is the biggest scam of the nation after independence thrust upon the country by its ineffective government, corrupt bureaucrats and decision makers of defence forces.DRDO and its other labs must get the defence products developed by the country’s established manufacturers in private sectors, and I am sure that will be accepted by the India forces, as they have allergy for known reasons only with the government PSUs with no fund to entertain customers. Will some change be coming? With 4+ years gone, there in no inkling of that.God save country from its country men with vested interest.However, let every country man must know convincingly that India today can manufacture 90% of the defence equipment-guns, artillery guns, tanks, FICVs, submarines, destroyers, aircraft carriers, helicopters, fighters, UAVs, drones required by defence forces.

2

I fully agree with a statement that appeared in one of the columns of Financial Express: “HAL appears to be sandwiched between politics of designers, end-users, decision-makers, media, and reality distortion attempts by large arms merchants.” HAL requires stronger boss and restructuring to get over the problem. There is no point in running DPSUs in this shoddy manner in an era when even countries like Iran and Turkey are trying to have a strong defence production with fighter and aircraft carrier of its own. Government and defence ministry must intervene with the different inter-related institutions and either sort out the issues or privatise companies like HAL or close it. DRDO on its part must try to induce and sell its developed, designed and innovated products to private companies for production, as it did in case of 155 artillery guns to Tata Power and Bharat Forge. IAF and Army will find it easier to work with private companies, as they may meet their requirements better.

3

A new Boss at HAL: Will it bring a difference in working of HAL? Will the production of Tejas and helicopters go up? Will Madhavan be able to have better luck with IAF? As reported in media, R Madhavan has taken over as Chairman and Managing Director of defence PSU Hindustan Aeronautics Limited from T Suvarna Raju on Saturday. Madhavan was heading the Accessories Division of HAL at Lucknow as an Executive Director. I wish this appointment could be lateral one with best brain of manufacturing taking over. May be it could be from L&T, Tata or from Boeing or Airbus as private companies are doing. As it seems, the change will not matter much. From last April to August, media has not reported any addition in Tejas pool in its newly formed squadron. Anyone knowing more must contribute.