Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
joy the consequential hefty bribes and other favours. Foreign suppliers support this because
they prefer to manufacture and assemble expensively abroad, and pay the bribes (usually
indirectly to obscure the sources), while relying on India's low-cost manufacturers for relat-
ively minor components. Such an approach prevents Indian companies growing into com-
petitors as final assemblers of complex weaponry.
Everyone, with some exceptions of course, from public sector chairmen down to office
peons and manual labourers, thrives on a system that, despite the patriotism and loyalty of
many of those involved, sees the protection of employment as its primary aim, with tech-
nical, commercial and financial issues as subsidiary considerations. Along with the DPSUs,
the defence ministry does not want change, and nor do the mass of the armed forces, despite
considerable unhappiness with what is available from the public sector. There are also
politically powerful trade union federations in the industry that thrive in the present set-up
and resist change.
Senior retired officials, who have spent large parts of their careers in the defence estab-
lishment, are amazingly critical of how they had to work, citing misguided procedures, ex-
cessive secrecy, and a lack of planning, communication and transparency. 29 I have heard
them talk about how procedures are aimed more at spending budgeted funds than building
defence capability, and that procurement of weaponry is 'not seen as an issue of national
security' but as a bureaucratic exercise.
Antony and Other Blockages
In recent years, the failure to introduce reforms has been led by the defence minister, A.K.
Antony, a mild veteran Congress politician from the southern state of Kerala, where he was
earlier chief minister. He is proud of his uncorruptable reputation, and is regarded as one of
the politicians most trusted by Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. This has made him secure in the
post, despite increasing criticism of his lack of drive and effectiveness. Appointed in 2006,
he shied away from as many reforms as he could, and slowed down plans that were being
backed by his predecessor, Pranab Mukherjee, now India's President. Antony's Kerala base
is significant because the Congress there is pulled leftwards by a communist-led coalition
that is its main rival for power in the state assembly. This strengthens his support for public
sector trade unions that resist change to protect their members' jobs. Uday Bhaskar, a de-
fence and security policy expert and former navy officer, 30 wrote Antony an open letter in
May 2012, saying his track-record was 'disappointing'. Bhaskar taunted him by suggest-
ing that the defence forces were so ill-prepared that India could 'inadvertently repeat the
1962 experience' - a reference to its defeat that year by China. The Cabinet Committee
on Security and Political Affairs, Bhaskar added, suffered from 'perceived abdication in
decision-making' and there was 'stasis in higher defence management'. 31
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