New Delhi: Defence Minister AK Antony on Wednesday said despite a "huge budget" set aside by the government, efforts for modernising the armed forces "have not borne the desired results" because of procedural delays which need to be eliminated.
"Modernisation of our armed forces remains the top priority for us. However, despite our best intentions and earmarking huge budgets and allocating money, the modernisation efforts have not borne the desired results," Antony said, addressing the the 5th International Conference on 'Energising Indian Aerospace Industry: Achievements and Future Strategies'.
He said the authorities "must continuously reduce and even eliminate procedural delays and bottlenecks in our procurement procedures".
"It is with this realisation that we have put in place a Defence Procurement Procedure that is amended every year to speed up procurement and bring in fairness and transparency to the system," he said.
The defence minister said the discussions on the issue of offsets would be of great interest and relevance.
He said the government was "willing to learn from international experience" but "such deliberations also give us an opportunity to remove some undesired and needless misgivings on the issue".
He said the nation had been recording an impressive economic growth and this also meant shouldering bigger responsibilities in the strategic context. "The emerging strategic landscape the world over will require a further strengthening of aerospace capabilities and India is certainly no exception. As you endeavour to do the same, you must break-up the challenges in the aerospace sector into fragments and then join the dots and fill the gaps to form the larger picture," he told the officers attending the seminar.
He said nations were today grappling with similar challenges and therefore "need to draw up coordinated responses".
"Keeping pace with the technology curve is a major challenge for developing nations like ours. Nations need to maximise cooperation through regular military exercises, weapons training and share their experiences with each other."
Anthony said the government's "efforts at strengthening our armed forces are often misconstrued by some nations".
"India has had a proven track record in harnessing technology for peaceful and non-violent purposes and ones that are essentially aimed to strengthen our defence capabilities. Translated in the context of aerospace industry, it would mean enhancing military and dual-use technology that would benefit our armed forces and also have spin-off benefits for the civil populace."
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