INTRODUCTION India accounts for substantial military spend on acquisitions, around US$ 13 billion annually, and the growth in acquisition budget over the last 10 years is significantly higher than the growth in both the Central Government expenditure and Defence expenditure. Though India has substantial military manufacturing capability through technology transfer to Defence Public Sector Undertakings (DPSUs) and Ordnance factories, India is critically dependent on major systems, platforms and aircraft to the tune of 70 percent on a perennial basis. This warrants recommendation at various levels to improve the Self Reliance Index from the present level of 30 percent to 70 percent in the next decade.

The Defence Production Policy 2011 is a pious policy postulation in this direction.

However, the progress so far in terms of policy facilitation and implementation has been rather lukewarm. This paper seeks to provide an overview of the gaps in critical technology that is contributing to our low Self Reliance index and the keys to improve self reliance.

2. Gaps in Critical Technology and Self Reliance

The major technologies in defence platforms are the Seeker, Focal plane Array, Active Electronically Scanned Array Radar, Ring Laser Gyro, Stealth Technology and Single Crystal Blade and they cut across the requirement of all the services.

FOCAL PLANE ARRAY (FPA) Focal plane arrays (FPA) are detectors which consist of a linear or two-dimensional matrix of individual elements. They are used at the focus of imaging systems e.g. Satellite Imagery, etc.

FPAs are used in astronomical imaging, aerial reconnaissance, aerial mapping, spectrographic analysis, star tracking, machine vision, X-ray diffraction and measurement applications. They can be visible, near Infrared, mid Infrared and far Infrared. The Linear Array consists of single line of pixels and the Area Array consists of rows and columns of pixels.

A pictorial diagram of FPA is as under :

AESA Radar

AESA Radar is a type of phased array radar whose transmitter and receiver functions are composed of a numbers of small, solid slate TR (Transmit/ Receive) modules.

AESAs aim their “beam” by broadcasting radio energy that interfere constructively at certain angles in front of the antenna. They improve on the older passive electronically scanned radars by spreading their broadcasts out across a band of frequencies, which makes it very difficult to detect over background noise. AESAs allow ships and aircraft to broadcast powerful radar signals while still remaining stealthy.

The advantages of AESA Radars are in range, low probability of intercept and high jamming resistance. Replacing a mechanically scanned array with a fixed AESA mount can help reduce an aircraft’s overall radar cross-section (RCS).

Presently Northrop Grumman/ Raytheon use it for the F-22 Raptor, Falcon F-35, F 16 (UAE only), and F/A 18 Super Hornet.

A pictorial diagram of AESA Radar is given below :

Ring Laser Gyro

A Ring Laser Gyroscope (RLG) consists of a ring laser having two counter-propagating modes over the same path in order to detect rotation. It operates on the principle of the Sigma effect which shifts the nulls of the internal standing wave pattern in response to angular rotation. Interference between the counter propagating beams, observed externally, reflects shifts in that standing wave pattern, and thus rotation.

A Schematic Diagram is placed below :

Stealth Technology

It enables an aircraft to be partially invisible to radar or IR signature. In simple terms, stealth technology allows an aircraft to be partially invisible to Radar or any other means of detection. This doesn’t allow the aircraft to be fully invisible on radar. Stealth technology cannot make the aircraft invisible to enemy or friendly radar but it helps reduce the detection range or an aircraft. The aerodynamic design of an aircraft plays a key role, and heat emitting engines particularly have to be covered within the body. This is similar to the camouflage tactics used by soldiers in jungle warfare.

The principle of reflection and absorption makes a vehicle “stealthy”, deflecting the incoming radar waves into another direction and thus reducing the number of waves. Another concept is to absorb the incoming radar waves totally and to redirect the absorbed electromagnetic energy in another direction. Whatever may be the method, the level of stealth a vehicle can achieve depends totally on the design and the substance with which it is made of. Technology used is Reflected waves, Infrared (heat), Wavelength match, OTH radar (over-the-horizon radar) and Special coating.

Presently F 22 Raptor and F-35 Lighting-II are using this technology. Russia has also developed the FGFA, in which India is a partner.

3. STRATEGY TO IMPROVE SELF RELIANCE

1. FDI Policy and Technology Transfer: There is an urgent need to review the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) policy and upscale it to 50 percent based on successful JV models like Brahmos and target key technologies. Technology transfer has to be part of the policy and suitable multiplier applied to key technology.
2. Dual use technologies in areas like Cryptology, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Sensors, Nano technology, and strategic defence electronics should be the thrust. There should be a single point agency to monitor inflow of new desirable technologies and an appropriate mechanism put in place to check the quality and value of technology being transferred.
3. Sharing Long Term Integrated Perspective Plan (LTIPP) of the Services seeks to fill up the capability gap of the armed forces based on existing capability, threat perception and adversary’s likely acquisition of platforms and systems. The LTIPP needs to be shared with the Indian defence industry (barring strategic systems) and DRDO which will help them to draw up their investment and R&D needs and build up capacity and capability plan accordingly.
4. A Defence Technology fund should be created which will provide funding needs of DPSUs/OFs/Private sector, academic and the lab(s). The recommendations of the Defence Production Policy (2011) must be operationalised early.
5. Concurrently a Defence Modernisation Fund needs to be created in Ministry of Defence (MoD) to support the Infrastructure and capacity build up requirement of the DPSUs/OFs/private sector. Such initiatives would help the shipyards particularly who are in acute need for modernisation and up-gradation of facilities.
6. India’s Export Policy should envisage a surge in defence exports. So far, there is a lot of red tape, and various defence items are cleared on a case to case basis. There is also no clarity on what products and which countries are restricted. This anomaly would need to be resolved. The Kelkar Committee (2005) had also called for a relook in to the negative list maintained by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) and evolving a product strategy for exports. India’s products like the Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH), Brahmos missile and small arms have immense export potential and must be actively pursued with countries that look for our cost effective exports. This would also make these products cheaper due to the rise in production numbers.
7. Removing Protectionist Bias towards DPSUs/ OFs The present arrangement of Department of Defence Production (DDP) overseeing the interests of both the public and private sector entities is flawed as there is a built-in bias to protect the interests of DPSU/OFs to ensure their capacity utilization. This is often at the cost of economy, quality and timely delivery. It has been amply demonstrated in the case of patrol vessels that upcoming shipyards like Pipavav sell their deliverables at a much lower rate given an opportunity to compete, which DPP-2011 now provides.
   There are the keys to India’s march towards higher self-reliance:
   1. Public & Private Sector Partnerships Public private partnership would need to be consciously nurtured. It has been a very successful model in the national highway programme. Partnerships between HAL and Tatas for aero structures and UAVs, OFs with Mahindra and Mahindra for FICV, 155 mm guns, MDL and GRSE with Pipavav, L&T and ABG for patrolling vessels and frigates should be forged.
   2. ii) Public Public Partnership Despite enormous complementarities in their production capability, the DPSUs rarely synergize. For instance HAL and BEL can be very effective partners in the areas of communication, defence electronics, visual display devices, radars, Software Defined Radio, Synthetic Aperture Radars and various pay loads like FLIR. Even UAV airframe and systems integration can be an excellent area of cooperation between HAL, BEL, DRDO and OEMs. Presently, for all our requirements of UAVs by the three Services, India is dependent on one foreign company. Similarly MIDHANI can be a major source of supply for super alloys like titanium steel which can be used for engine components manufactured by HAL, as it has already absorbed the technology successfully from Russia. Ironically the requirements are being sourced from Russia. MIDHANI’s capacity can be ramped up which will divest HAL of its import dependence substantially. OFs can also forge excellent partnership with MIDHANI in the areas of forging and casting of gun barrels.
   3. Joint Venture and Joint Technology Development Given the enormous gaps in indigenous manufacturing and design capability gap vis-à-vis reputed global majors, the most viable option to leapfrog is not by reinventing the wheel but by forging partnership with global companies. Brahmos, where India has a 50: 50 JV partnership with Russia for manufacturing cruise missiles, is a major success story. There are other partnerships in the offing with Russia for design, development and production of aircraft. With the French also, such co-development arrangements are in the pipeline for short range and medium range missiles.
      In futuristic combat vehicles, tactical communication systems, major artillery systems and submarines, such joint venture arrangements could provide excellent opportunities to build state of the art systems. China is targeting itself as a major supplier of wings, landing gear and composite structures and is a first tier supplier of fuselage sections. In comparison India’s exports is limited to supply of doors to Airbus, wiring harnesses, uplock boxes and detailed engineering drawings. In order to graduate to higher level of presence in the global aerospace, China’s aviation major AVIC-1 is having alliance with Bombardier on ARJ 21 and with Airbus for final assembly of A320.
      Though Russia has considerable design and production capability of fighter and transport aircrafts, yet its major design house, NPO-Saturn, is having JV with France’s Safran for building an engine for regional Jet (SAM 146) in competition with GE. These are major lessons for India’s aviation majors like HAL and private sector primes like Tatas.
   4. Synergy Between Design House, Production Houses and Users As early as the 1960s, a committee had recommended that the production agency of a system should be in charge of its design and development also. This was in the context of gas turbine engine development for a fighter aircraft.
      The serious hiccups in the Kaveri gas turbine engine programme in terms of fully equipped Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) is partly attributable to the lack of synergy between the engine programme and the production programme. On the other hand, missile programmes like the Prithvi have seen success due to proper synergy between DRDL, the development agency and BDL, the production agency. The Rama Rao committee had recommended in 2007 that the engine development programme should come under HAL to ensure accountability.

This is a sensitive policy issue. However, this has to be addressed. For instance, all the aerospace sector related laboratories like GTRE, LRDE, DARE, ADE, NAL and ADA and the production agency, which is HAL, can be brought together under one umbrella with overall accountability in terms of all deliverables, aircraft and helicopters included.

The Government has to play a pivotal role in bringing together each major stakeholder viz. MOD, Services, DPSUs/OFs, DRDO, private sector and the OEMs who have a tendency to indulge in blame game. Self Reliance in design, development and production of major subsystems and platforms has to be a concerted national effort.