NEW DELHI: The meeting of the standing committee on defence saw MPs cutting across party lines grilling the defence establishment on India’s state of battle-readiness. Army chief General VK Singh’s letter addressed to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the issue formed the basis of their interrogation.
Quoting extensively from General Singh’s letter to the prime minister, which was written on March 12, Congress MP from Ludhiana, Manish Tewari, asked top brass of the defence establishment about the veracity of its contents, and whether there were critical gaps in India’s readiness to meet any challenges, as highlighted by the letter.
Among those in attendance were defence secretary Shashikant Sharma and vice-chief of Army Staff, Lt General SK Singh.
RJD member Ram Kripal Yadav took off from where Congress MP Tewari had left. Yadav asked the defence officials whether the allocation made by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee in this year’s budget was sufficient for the armed forces to take on the might of India’s enemies, particularly China.
The defence secretary, in his response, is said to have admitted there were holes in India’s defence preparedness, but, insisted, at the same time, that they would be addressed in the next two years. “There are shortcomings, but the modernisation and expansion process is going on in full swing,” Sharma said.
He added the country’s armed forces were ready to face any challenge, and that there was no cause of concern on this count.
On being asked whether there was anything unusual in chief of Army staff writing a letter to the PM pointing out the gaps in the country’s defence preparedness, Sharma said this was part of a long-established tradition.
General Singh’s letter had prompted defence minister AK Antony to direct the armed forces to streamline arms acquisition and to fix accountability in cases of delay. In an hour-long meeting with General Singh and senior Army and ministry officials on April 2 to review proposals relating to capital acquisition in the service, the minister had favoured providing more financial powers to services’ headquarters if it helped in speedier acquisition of equipment and weapon systems.
General Singh’s letter to the prime minister, which was leaked to the media, said the country’s security might be at risk owing to the fact that tanks were running out of ammunition, air defence was going obsolete and the infantry was operating without critical weapons.
Singh wrote the letter to the prime minister on March 12, a fortnight before coming up with the claim that he was offered a Rs 14-crore bribe to clear a vehicle purchase. CBI is probing whether there were any irregularities in the purchase of Tatra trucks.
The Army chief’s letter rocked both Houses of Parliament, with the Opposition creating an uproar over the issue. The government conceded that there, indeed, were gaps in India’s defence preparedness, but steps were taken to plug them.
“There is obviously a gap in the capabilities. We are trying to bridge that gap,” minister of state for defence Pallam Raju had told newspersons.
In the letter, Singh asked the prime minister to pass suitable directions to enhance the preparedness of the Army. “The state of the major (fighting) arms i.e., mechanised forces, artillery, air defence, infantry and special forces, as well as the engineers and signals, is indeed alarming,” Singh wrote in his letter.
He added that while there was lack of critical ammunition for the entire tank fleet, the country’s air defence was “97% obsolete and it doesn’t give the deemed confidence to protect…from the air.”
Also, the infantry was crippled with “deficiencies of crew served weapon” and that it lacked “night fighting” capabilities. Elite Special Forces, on the other hand, were “woefully short” of “essential weapons”. Lamenting the complex and slow defence procurement procedures, General Singh said there was “hollowness” in the present system. He also hit out at indigenous ordnance factories, saying they produce weapon systems and other fighting material of poor quality with no sense of urgency.
Maintaining that the shortcomings were severely eroding the Army’s preparedness, he stressed the need to “urgently mitigate” these “critical deficiencies” that were “impacting the operational capability” of a 1.3 million-strong Army.