Red-tapism made acquisition process a vicious cycle: Indian Army Chief

New Delhi, Jan 21 : Self-reliance is a strategic necessity but to achieve it a revolution is needed in bureaucratic affairs, Indian Army Chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane has said while pointing out that defence modernisation is often held hostage to the processes and procedures involved.
Gen Naravane said red-tapism has made the defence acquisition process a “vicious cycle”.
“We need a revolution in bureaucratic affairs to realise the vision of self-reliance,” he said while speaking on the occasion of 25 years of Army-industry partnership at a virtual conference.
Talking about the Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020, he said it has been aligned to empower domestic industry. He appreciated the government’s initiative to increase the FDI in defence production to 74 per cent from the existing 49 per cent. But he made a point that more needs to be done.
“While all these initiatives are quite appreciable, there is a lot of work that still needs to be done,” said Gen Naravane. He also quoted late Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar as saying that the “entire procurement process is based on distrust”.
“There are certain inherent procedural lacunae that have crept into the acquisition process which primarily arises due to the overbearing nature of our rules, regulations and guidelines in trying to ensure zero error,” said Gen Naravane adding, “This is also aggravated by our own interpretation of rules.”