Defense

In a big push for Atmanirbhar Bharat, the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) approved buying of defence equipment worth Rs 13,700 crore for the three armed forces that also includes 118 Arjun Main Battle Tank (MK-1A) for the Indian Army. The Defence Ministry has cleared a Rs 6,000 crore proposal to procure these Arjun Mk-1A Main Battle Tanks.

Augmented Reality Head Mounted Display (ARHMD) System is conceived as a capability enhancement to Land Based Air Defence Weapon Systems such as IGLA shoulder fired Infra Red Homing Air Defence Missile System and ZU 23mm 2B AD Gun System which will provide the operator with radar and Thermal Imaging (TI) sight outputs as overlays.

Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), under the chairmanship of Raksha Mantri Shri Rajnath Singh, has approved capital acquisition proposals of various weapons/platforms/equipment/
systems required by the Indian Army, Indian Navy and Indian Air Force, in New Delhi on February 23, 2021.

According to Indian Navy officers aware of the developments, the Western Fleet with its newly appointed commander Rear Admiral Ajay Kochhar will conduct advanced exercises with the French carrier task force. While Charles de Gaulle is a 42,500 tonne aircraft carrier with Rafale M fighters on board, INS Vikramaditya is a conventionally powered aircraft carrier with displacement of 44,500 tonne and has MiG-29K aircraft on board.

Nearly two years after India demonstrated its anti-satellite (ASAT) technology through ‘Mission Shakti’, the newly formed Defence Space Agency (DSA), a quiet dedicated organisation established to drive India’s counter-space activities has officially begun scouting for technologies to augment its capabilities to deal with threats in, and from space.

On Monday, the engineering and technology company Bharat Forge Ltd. and the multinational aerospace and technology corporation Paramount Group entered into a partnership to merge technologies, skills and expertise for the development of armoured vehicles in India.

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.