Defense

India has reserved over Rs 70,000 crore of its defence capital budget only for the domestic sector as part of a series of steps to remove the tag of being among the world’s largest importer of weapons. Announcing that 63 percent of the outlay in the current budget is for domestic procurement, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said that it would go a long way in boosting the industry and another negative list for imports is likely to be issued soon.

In a major boost to indigenous defence technologies, at least 51% of the 123 LCA Tejas fighters that will be inducted into the Indian Air Force (IAF) will have the desi Uttam radar, replacing Israeli radars that the first batch of aircraft will be equipped with.

A ‘Kargil Vijay Smarak’ was unveiled in southern Assam’s Silchar town to remember the Indian Army martyrs in the Kargil war against Pakistan in 1999.

Indigenously designed and developed by DRDO for Indian Navy, VL-SRSAM is meant for neutralizing various aerial threats at close ranges including sea-skimming targets. The current launches were carried out for demonstration of vertical launch capability as part of its maiden launch campaign.

The Indian Air Force (IAF), in a first, on Thursday deployed its most advanced Apache fighter helicopters in Sikkim, a frontier state with China. Two of four districts in Sikkim – North and East Sikkim – share boundaries with China along the eastern sector of the Line of Actual Control, along with Arunachal Pradesh.

Joint User Trials for Helina (Army Version) and Dhruvastra (Air Force Version) Missile Systemshave been carried out from Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) platform in desert ranges. The missile systems have been designed and developed indigenously by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

The Indian Navy’s ability to train personnel to mitigate emergencies at sea will get a further boost with Goa Shipyard Ltd (GSL) commencing construction of a damage control simulator for the Andaman and Nicobar Command at Port Blair.

The government has approved creation of 18 border patrol tracks in Arunachal Pradesh to improve patrolling along the India-China border, as proposed by a home ministry committee, said officials. This will help the Indian Army and Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) develop infrastructure in inaccessible areas adjoining China, they said.