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Scientist Leaving DRDO — Why call Attrition?

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Dear friends while surfing I found the very sensible analysis of DRDO problems/solutions by Sh R C Chakraborty, Ex Director, DTRL, DRDO.

Prabhu Dandriyal

Scientist Leaving DRDO — Why call Attrition?

June 23, 2007, posted by rnyreaders http://myreaders.wordpress.com/,

R C Chakraborty,-rcchak@gmail.com

http://www.myreaders.info/02_Scientist__leaving__DRDO.pdf

The DRDO Directors’ Conference held on February, 21, 2007 was effective in a sense that media started reminding about DRDO functioning more frequently. For example, the dissatisfaction expressed by the Parliament’s standing committee on defence, the Minister A.K. Antony asking DRDO to answer for the huge delays in high profile projects, the concern expressed by Defence Services on DRDO projects and deliverables, the criticism of the individuals and an appreciation for the Government action in short listing private firms for granting the status of Rakshya Udyog Ratna. DRDO of course tried to read in between the lines, expressing — “High attrition rate of young scientists … The DRDO’s representation to the Pay Commission . . . proposals to increase salaries of its scientists to arrest the exodus ? . . . and so on “. Extracts from few such reporting are reproduced below for quick reference.

• Address at the DRDO Directors’ Conference, dated 21/02/2007, by the President Dr.A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, The Hindu, dated 22/02/2007, “Set goal for self-reliance in defence systems”: Kalam , by Special Correspondent. President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and Defence Minister A.K. Antony on Wednesday asked defence scientists to bring about a change in their functioning to deliver on India’s requirements of futuristic weapon platforms. “When an organization functions; for over five decades …..A change in the organizational culture is required based on present-day technology and infrastructure . . . . Advising that the DRDO be reorganized after every five years based on the dynamics of organizational missions. Mr. Antony … asked them to be prepared to answer for the huge delays in some of the high profile projects……..

• Indian_Express_dated 14/06/2007: DRDO Scientists are leaving to the greener avenues available in the Private Sector. More than 300 Scientists and Technical staff have left DRDO in the year 2006.

• Tribune_Chandigarh dated 28/04.2007 : “During 2002-2006, . . . 1,007 scientists left DRDO due to increased opportunities available in the private sector,” DRDO is seeking a four-fold increase in salaries . . . from the Sixth Pay Commission.

• Citizen Journalism, citizenxpress.com dated 15/0612007 Because of better career prospects nearly 33% of people who loin DRDQ quit (attrition rate as BPO), nearly 20% use DRDQ as stepping stone, nearly 13% are having due to lack of professional challenge and 8% leave DRDO looking for advancement and additional qualifications.

• The Hindu dated 23/12/2007 Defence Minister, A K Antony said “concerns had been expressed in various quarters over the functioning or the DRDO. The time has come to look ‘toward and see whether the organization is tuning itself adequately, to the changing time.

• Hindustan Times, dated 17/06/2007: 1,007 DRDO scientists quit in five years.

  • DRDO criticized for huge time and cost overruns its multifarious projects, saw  1007 scientist quitting in the last five years, Parliament was informed Thursday
  • Earlier this week, Antony had served notice on DRDO to quickly rectify the defects in the Arjun Main Battle Tank (MBT) it has been developing since 1970s or the government would be wind up the project.
  • Indian Army refused to induct the tank citing 14 major technical defects.
  • A parliamentary panel, last month rapped the DRDO for failing to meet its import substitution targets by as much as 50 per cent, saying hue overruns in its big ticket projects -warranted a “thorough review” of its functioning.
  • Parliaments standing committee report on the DRDO: During the 10th Plan (2002- 07), targeted 70% indigenization, only 30-35% could be achieved. Even after 48 years of its formation has not achieved its targeted mission of self reliance. Urgent need for a thorough review’ of its functioning and organizational structure “to increase its efficiency”. Pointing delays in the MBT, LCA and its Kaveri engine, and integrated guided missile development programme (IGMDP). Noting “No scientific audit at any point of time of DRDO and its projects”, recommended that the organizations projects “must be audited by external and independent groups of experts approved by the government.

• Bharat Rakshak, Consortium of Indian Defence Website, dated 11/06/2007, India’s R&D in Defence DRDO, PSUs and Private Sector, Times of India, 19/06/2007: Godrej has big plans for military hardware. The $1.7 billion Godrej Group plans to give a major push to its military equipment supply, creating private Sector in manufacturing defence hardware. Already in nuclear and space technology and now plan to vigorously pursue in defence. Group Chairman Adi Godrej said. . . supplier of airframe sections for the Brahrmos missile, supply o equipments for satellite launch, nuclear sector, and refineries. Government short listed 1,3 private firms for granting the status of Rakshya Udyog Retna. The list was handed over to Defence Minister A K Antony by Probir Sengupta, the chairman of the government-appointed selection committee, on June 6.

•The Indian Express dated 23/06/2007, “Just DRDO won’t do’, why India has MNCs in IT, pharma, telecom but not in defence research. by Milind Deora, 2 1/11/2006.

  • In 1958, the DARPA was set up by USA, Dept of Defense and same year India established the RDO. While DARPA has been a huge success DRDO still hasn’t been able to achieve its vision — everything that really matters in the Indian military is stilt imported.
  • A special CAG review in 2000 of found: almost 50 per cent of the DRDO’s budget was spent on salaries; present ratio of scientists to other support personals is 1:5 in DRDO compared 1: 0.7 to DARPA.
  • World -class scientists are acquired from private sector and universities, Supporting personals are temporary, hired from other agencies so that DARPA doesn’t have to support them on a permanent basis.
  • US defence budget is almost 25 times larger than that of India, but then DARPA’s annual budget is only twice that of DRDO’s, because DARPA is focused on high-end technologies, leaving other- systems to industry. This has enabled it to stay lean.
  • For Arjun MBT and Akash missile, DRDO needs to follow better management practices to deliver indigenous technologies to the military. The production of juices and insect repellants are other instance where the DRDO urgently needs to rethink is focus.
  • DROD labs should avoid any kind of overlap and duplication. The organization must, draw up a list of future technologies based on certain criteria and go after them aggressively.

— First strategic  technology that no  country may sell to India— e.g., nuclear weapons, surveillance and communications  satellites and long range cruise missiles.

–       Second, technologies which are heading towards a global monopoly like conventional submarines  presently being sold at very, high price.

–     Third, future technologies on drawing boards all over the world — like unmanned  combat  aerial vehicles (UCAV5), unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) and robot soldiers.

  • If our other scientific and research organizations can make the world’s most competitive satellite launch vehicles, we can surely do the same for defence technologies.

• intent Blog, http://www.intentblog.com/archives/2OO6/12/how India .can s.hgj, dated 14/12/2006, How India Can Stop Subsidizing Russia And Israel by Milind Deora, India can build strong indigenous capabilities while creating competitive benchmarks for DRDO through the active participation of the private sector. . . If India has built world- class multinationals in sectors such as information technology and pharmaceuticals, both of which are knowledge-driven industries, we could easily create a handful of defence multinationals in less than a decade. . . A small nation like Israel accounts for a 10th of world defence sales and approximately a 5th of its exports are defence- related. While India had an annual import bill of around $5 billion last year, we exported a paltry $47 million worth of arms. Pakistan, which lacks industrial base, exported nearly twice as much. . . In addition to reforming the DRDO, the viability of select DPSUs, especially those not dealing with core areas like the production of missiles and warheads, should also be re-examined and certain products like food products should ether he scrapped or outsourced to lower-cost vendors.

Expressing such dissatisfaction, criticism or concern about DRDO accomplishment is not new. After the Kargil war (1999) DRDO activities were subjected to some scrutiny and a few reforms were suggested, but Not much was done on those recommendations (The Indian Express, 23/06/2007). Also, commenting on the DRDO in isolation, without looking at the higher defence management framework within which it is placed, would perhaps lead to incomplete or even flawed deductions,

Assuming that what all is said is correct, then DRDO must be 1ooking for alternatives to its failures, which means DRDO is preparing to take few “hard decisions”.

Some hard decisions I have in my mind which I would like to share are.

1. GET RID OF THE STUFF DRDO SHOULD GO WITHOUT.

2. All System Development projects and programs should be taken out of DRDC, because of very little R&D opportunity. The R&D element is just 10% while 90% is engineering design, fabrication, testing, integration, field trials, acceptance and management. Each of these better done elsewhere and not by R&D mind. The implementation responsibility would also he oti those who do these 90c/o work and finally on a Board. DRDO contribution, claim, responsibility, budget allocation, manpower, infrastructure, and management should relate to that 10% only.

3. Further, the Most Technology Demonstration projects should also be take ii out of DRDD. The reason is same said above. The R&D elements in these TD projects are just 40% or less. Indian industries, particularly the private sectors, offer better compensation and therefore have better human resources. They would better absorb this 40% R&D elements along with rest 60% activity.

4. Lastly, a few Technology Demonstration projects where R&D elements are 40% or more and all the S&T projects where R&D elements are 100%, there DRDO has it primary role that is : “Convert scientific know- how into usable technologies. Here also DRDO need to evolve partnership with the academic institutions, funded by government or privately managed. All such projects are identified as (a) Basic Research that produces new knowledge in scientific or technology areas of interest to the military and (b) Applied Research that supports the exploratory development of new technologies for specific military applications or further development of existing technology for new military applications. The procedures followed by DARPA can be adopted to ensue transparence, equal opportunity, accountability, quality and most importantly revealing what followed next.

My best regards to friends in DRDO, a great organization that helped me to grow over a period of 30 years

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DRDO gets it right when it works unlike DRDO

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Express Investigation: Delayed Research; Delayed Organisation – Part – Seven

DRDO gets it right when it works unlike DRDO

Amitav Ranjan
Posted: Sat Nov 18 2006, 00:00 hrs
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 17:


For all its defences against non-performance, the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO), ironically, has only to look within for ready templates of distinction. Programmes that have met targets are an isolated few but they worked well because their ethic symbolizes a fundamental breakaway from the tedium of the larger organisation’s default approach. Self-reliance, a term battered by DRDO’s track-record on showpiece programmes, shines beneath the hood in the Navy’s sonars, avionics and electronic warfare systems on IAF fighter aircraft and missiles developed under corporate foreign joint ventures.
The first two were developed on time because of the labs linking up with the armed forces right from the initial stages and, significantly, leadership that keeps young scientists on their toes. The latter, because international partnerships mandate a more professional approach to programme completion.
One of the most successful DRDO laboratories is also one of the least known, tucked away silently in the Trikkakara suburb of Kochi, fomenting applied research and technology to give the Navy real self-reliance in critical sensor systems.

The Naval Physical and Oceanographic Laboratory (NPOL), the only DRDO lab to win both the Silicon Trophy and Titanium Trophy for excellence, has, in the last two decades, given the Navy an impressive 87 per cent self-reliance in acoustic sensors for warships and submarines. All Navy warships, including foreign ones, as a result, are fitted with DRDO sonars like the APSOH, HUMVAD and HUMSA, and the Navy does not need to import. Now, it is putting its finishing touches to the USHUS sonar for the Navy’s Kilo-class submarines and the Mihir dunking sonar for HAL’s Advanced Light Helicopter, all well within their projected timeframes.

Vice Admiral Madanjit Singh, formerly the Navy’s Southern Commander at Kochi, said, “The NPOL’s success is from user involvement right from the word go. The steering panel is headed by a serving Naval commander who sets the agenda, efforts between the DRDO and Navy are joint.”

VK Aatre, former NPOL director who went on to become DRDO chief, agrees. “When I was there, we could not distinguish between designers, Navy personnel and production engineers,” he said. “We shared an excellent rapport. The difference here was that the user was part of the design team.”

The lab’s current director V Chander, an IIT-IISc alumnus, has espoused applied research like no other DRDO establishment, working not for idealistic invention, but delivering quality, fool-proof sonar systems to the Navy. How?

First, he’s rechristened the HR cell as People, Academics, Research & Training. He’s made sure young scientists get to spend time with the Navy for extended periods of time rather than labour away only in their laboratories. Third, he’s made sure that the level of involvement with warships and the Navy is so high that projects are either completed or prudently foreclosed before despondence and lassitude can set in.

Vice Admiral Singh, as DG Defence Planning in 2000, recommended to the Task Force on the Reorganization of Higher Defence Planning, that the country’s R&D labs be rationalized on the lines of NPOL. What ensued, another story entirely, was a turf war that saw the idea quietly dissipate. Another area where DRDO has shone despite itself is avionics and electronic warfare systems for IAF fighter aircraft.

The IAF’s most advanced fighter, the Sukhoi-30 MKI, flies with avionics developed by the Defence Avionics Research Establishment (DARE) in Bangalore, and has proved so good that the new British Hawk advanced jet trainers and the license-produced units of the upcoming contract for 126 foreign fighters, will be armed with DARE avionics and electronic warfare systems.

For now, in addition to the Sukhois, these arm IAF Jaguars and MiG-27s which, combined, have over 30 DARE electronic systems, including mission computers, electronic warfare suites, laser rangers and multifunction advanced cockpits.

A testimony to DARE’s work: in 2003, the Royal Malysian Air Force ordered radar computers worth Rs 21.15 crore (75 per cent of DRDO’s officially declared export value of Rs 27.93 crore) from DARE for its Sukhoi-30MM fighter fleet, and is interested in buying more.

Air Marshal JS Gujral, formerly IAF Central Air Commander and Deputy Chief in charge of acquisitions, feels DARE has done an excellent job in a world where such technology is simply too advanced to share. “DARE’s projects have succeeded also because of deep interfacing with the IAF. They have maintained a high mark in defence output and timeframes compared to DRDO’s other not-so-successful ventures. Across the board, the avionics and electronic warfare systems by DARE match up with the best in the world. The IAF has been very happy with what they have provided us,” Gujral said. DARE Director RP Ramalingam said, “DRDO has realized that if there is a WW III, the winner will be the side that can best control the electromagnetic spectrum, and has therefore placed India as a competent force in the world map of avionics.”

Foreign joint ventures, on the other hand, have compelled DRDO to put out more realistic predictions on time and cost. The BrahMos missile project, which began development in 1998 as a corporate joint venture with Russia and resulted in a world-class cruise missile that other countries now want to buy, was completed in just six years at a cost of Rs 667 crore – no time and cost overruns.

Similarly, the new generation Barak-II surface to air missile for the Navy, being developed by DRDO in a JV with Israel, is officially to cost Rs 2, 606.02 crore and be ready by May 2011, a far more realistic predictive frame than any other missile project under the indigenous IGMDP.

The defence sector does not have a policy for foreign direct investment, but DRDO open to joint ventures with foreign partners. No wonder then, that on June 7, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence said, “BrahMos model should be followed in other projects also. Private sector should be given more opportunities in defence production and user participation should be encouraged from R&D stage.”
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6,000 cr wasted, 10-yr delay & they want 150,000 cr more

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Express Investigation: Delayed Research; Delayed Organisation – Part – One

 6,000 cr wasted, 10-yr delay & they want 150,000 cr more

Amitav Ranjan

Posted: Sun Nov 12 2006, 00:00 hrs

New Delhi, November 11:

Make India prosperous by establishing a world-class science and technology base…provide our Defence Services the decisive edge by equipping them with internationally competitive systems and solutions… design, develop and lead to production state-of-the-art weapons systems…

That’s the “vision” and the “mission” the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO) has proudly spelt out for itself.

An investigation by The Sunday Express into official records that include detailed testimonies by the Ministry of Defence to a Parliamentary Standing Committee — its report is yet to be tabled in Parliament — shows that if there’s one thing this behemoth of 50 laboratories with a staff of about 33,000 has developed to almost perfection, it’s this: wrapping itself around the flag to hide a record of delay and non-delivery in virtually all major weapons programmes.

At a time when China is rapidly modernising its armed forces through international collaboration and acquiring advanced technology from abroad, the DRDO has become a prisoner of its own misleading slogan on self-reliance. In preventing the armed forces from buying urgently needed weapons with brave talk, “we can make it here”, and failing to deliver, the DRDO has introduced uncertainty into the government’s defence planning.

According to latest official records, obtained by this newspaper, in 12 of its showpiece projects, none of which is anywhere near completion, the DRDO has overshot sanctioned estimates by Rs 6,013.43 crore in just the last 10 years. The projects include the crucial guided missile programme, the Arjun tank, the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA Tejas), the Samyukta communication system and Kaveri jet engine.

To put this in perspective, this cost overrun is larger than DRDO’s budget of Rs 5,356 crore for the current year. And this is reflective of just 12 projects. It speaks nothing of 427 others, all in varying states of drift. And yet DRDO claims, “Global level R&D and any world-class defence product can be brought out in competitive time and cost.”

These were the words used in a September 22 presentation to the Standing Committee especially in the year of the organisation’s biggest symbolic failure, the Agni-III strategic missile.

But if cost overruns were not enough, consider this: Records show that for all major projects, DRDO’s average time overrun is 10.11 years (see chart). For example, a 16-year delay for the Arjun tank and 12 years for just Phase I of the LCA Tejas.

Responding to a written questionnaire from The Sunday Express, DRDO chief M Natarajan, who has also been involved with one of DRDO’s biggest failures, the Arjun tank, says: “This is a complaint which I hear very often. But one should understand these are all R&D projects. All advanced countries face similar situations. If you say that we are always late, then it would not be fair to us. We generally deliver the goods on time.”

If that were true, Natarajan must have had a trying time explaining that on October 29 at the very first DRDO presentation to new Defence Minister A K Antony. Drawing comparisons with the China-Russia relationship, Defence Secretary Shekhar Dutt reportedly wanted to know why there were such “massive delays” in DRDO projects and persistent technological gaps.

Former IAF chief Air Chief Marshal S Krishnaswamy was more direct. Called in a year after he retired to give testimony, he told the Parliamentary panel: “For improvement in DRDO’s working, it is essential to make fundamental changes in organization and structure with accountability to the user and to do work in time.”

Krishnaswamy couldn’t have been more spot on. For, although DRDO defended its performance by blaming the three services — they change their requirements while development is in progress, they spend too much time on trials — here’s just how bad the current situation is: In the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th Plans, with DRDO’s failures a compelling factor, according to the Defence Ministry, the country has spent an average of 24.25% of the Defence budget on imported systems to fill in holes caused by DRDO’s non-delivery. That translates into roughly Rs 42,376 crore since 1991-92.

Even the “self-reliance” index, the one plank the entire DRDO justifies itself on, has remained static for the last 15 years. Ironically, in 1991, it was President A P J Abdul Kalam, then DRDO chief, who charted out a plan to push self-reliance up to 70% by 2005. Today’s self-reliance index, according to the Ministry’s own estimate: 30 per cent.

 

Kalam, in fact, started the Self-Reliance Implementation Council (SRIC) in 1992 and monitored it to check for slippages and gaps. But that was more an academic exercise than anything else. For five years now, the council hasn’t met once.

Papers are only “activated” when Parliamentary questions are asked. In what has the armed forces on tenterhooks now, on October 29, the DRDO recommended to Antony that a “certain percentage of defence acquisitions be earmarked exclusively for DRDO and indigenously developed products.”

The total cost of 439 projects currently in progress with DRDO adds up to Rs 16,925 crore, with just 17 of those adding up to Rs 13,560 crore, most of them on time and cost extensions. In September, DRDO asked, in its testimony to the

Parliamentary committee, for an assured allocation of Rs 1,50,000 crore at the rate of Rs 10,000 crore per year for the next 15 years starting 2010.

It’s time Antony asked the DRDO a few questions, beginning with the Integrated Guided Missile Development programme. There is no indigenous weapons project as prestigious as this, neither is there one that matches its record of repeated and expensive failures.

Every project has to fructify within a given timeframe, otherwise it will just begin to drift and lose focus

Air Chief Marshal S Krishnaswamy

DRDO needs greater accountability. We have not been able to get the maximum out of DRDO, even though self-reliance should be our core

Gen V P Malik

 

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The case to support the indigenous LCA programme

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The case to support the indigenous LCA programme

Ashok Parthasarathi and Raman Puri

The facts with regard to perceived cost and time overruns and performance shortfalls in perspective

There have been several articles in the press critical of projects of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) in general, and specifically the programme relating to the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA), now named Tejas, and the Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme. Indeed, whenever a significant event that involves indigenous R&D, particularly defence-related, occurs, or a crucial decision is set to be taken, articles originating from within the defence “system,” or from vendors who see their business prospects threatened, appear. The real facts relating to the programme need to be put in context.

Performance shortfalls

The two issues on which the LCA project is criticised are cost and time overruns, and performance shortfalls. As regards the so-called time overruns, when the zero/go date for the project is taken as 1983, the critics fail to mention that what was sanctioned in 1983 was an ad hoc Rs.560 crore, pending full preparation of the Project Definition Document (PDD) — which is a fundamental step even to start the design and development process. The costs were to be finalised based on the PDD. This required the setting up of infrastructure in a hundred academic institutions and R&D laboratories and building up expertise to undertake the fundamental and application-oriented R&D required, and harnessing the design and engineering effort available largely in the public sector units for such a complex, state-of-the-art aircraft. The Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) discussed with Air Headquarters the Air Staff Requirement (ASR). Air Headquarters had requirements added to what was originally to be a replacement for the MiG-21. As a result, the ASR that was finalised was practically that for a Mirage 2000. But in the public perception the LCA remained as a replacement for MiG 21.

It look seven years, till 1990, to formulate the PDD. Based on this the ADA, in a report to the Ministry of Defence in 1990, gave a time-frame of seven years to develop the LCA and projected a financial requirement of Rs.4,000 crore. This included the building of four prototypes also. There had been a 25-year gap since the only fighter aircraft ever indigenously designed, developed and manufactured, namely the HF-24 Marut, had entered squadron service. So the period of seven years to set up a more advanced R&D infrastructure and build up even the core personnel needed to develop the technologies that the LCA’s ASR and PDD called for, was modest.

“Go-ahead”

After consideration, including by special committees, the Indian Air Force and the government gave the real operational go-ahead only in late-1993. Even that “go-ahead” covered the development of only two Technology Demonstrator Aircraft (TDA) without weaponisation. The funding approved was only of Rs.2,000 crore — half the amount requested for full-scale development. The first TDA flew in 2001, eight years from the real operational ‘go’ date, despite much additional R&D work that had to be undertaken due to the U.S. sanctions imposed in 1998.

Comments appeared in the media in 2001 quoting IAF sources to the effect that what the ADA had achieved was just a flying machine that was yet to be weaponised. Considering the nature and scope of the approval accorded in 1993, what else was to be expected? Using the money sanctioned for two TDAs, the ADA built four. Full-scale development, for which another Rs.2,000-plus crore was finally sanctioned, thus started only in late-2001. Some 1,200 hours of flight testing was to be undertaken to secure Initial Operational Clearance (IOC) from the IAF.

At that point, apart from the weaponisation requirements the project had to undergo extensive redesign to accommodate an air-to-air missile chosen by the IAF, which was considerably heavier and longer than what had been specified till 2000. The IAF had again changed its mind. This necessitated the complete redesign of the wing structure, using only composite materials in order to keep the weight within limits. The period of this redesign was also utilised to upgrade the avionics, to a completely open architecture.

Consequently, in “generational terms” the LCA is a fourth generation-plus aircraft with full networking capabilities. This made it more than comparable to anything the IAF had, and possibly would have, even after it acquires the 126 Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MRCA) now on tender, with first deliveries due eight years hence.

On the engine

It is true that the Kaveri engine for the LCA that the Gas Turbine Research Establishment (GTRE) of the DRDO has been developing for 12 years has not yet met its technical performance targets and requires redevelopment. So far the GE 404 engine from the U.S., which powers the F-16 fighter-bomber, has been used to power the LCA. The problems the GTRE has with the Kaveri are not unusual in a complex fighter aircraft engine project being undertaken for the first time. Moreover, the financial sanction of about Rs.320 crore given for engine development was possibly only to cover the Project Definition Phase and some high-risk technology development effort. We do not know of a first-of-type high-technology fighter aircraft engine being developed anywhere in less than a multi-billion dollar programme and a 20-year-plus development cycle. Even Snecma, the sole fighter aircraft engine manufacturer in France, despite decades of experience in developing and manufacturing engines for Mirage III, V and F-1, took about a decade and $2.2 billion to develop the M-88 engine for the Mirage 2000. The development of the Kaveri is unlikely to cross $1 billion.

The LCA with a GE 404 engine has done 800-plus hours of flight-testing. Even with that engine the performance has been not only vastly superior to that of even the recently upgraded MiG 21 BIS (the IAF is operating almost 400 of the series), but it has shown itself to be comparable in many critical parameters to the Mirage 2000. Modifications to the aircraft structure are under way to reduce weight and improve engine performance. When the GTRE’s joint venture with a leading foreign engine manufacturer for further development is completed in the next four years, the Kaveri will be brought up to a performance level, superior to the GE 404. Fitted with it, the LCA will be truly comparable to the Mirage 2000 and in many respects even superior. And all this in an aircraft much lighter than the Mirage 2000.

Superior

As for network-centric capability, which intrinsically needs indigenous systems for secrecy, security and inter-operability, it is superior in the LCA compared to any aircraft in the IAF’s inventory.

So it is a fallacy to think that we can continue the importing spree and still have such network-centric capability.

As recently as in 2005, the IAF’s requirement for 126 new aircraft was only for an upgraded Mirage 2000. At Rs.120 crore to Rs.140 crore a plane, compared to at least double that amount for any of the aircraft types now bidding for the 126 MRCA, is not the LCA a highly cost-effective fighter for volume induction into the IAF?

As for development costs, the LCA has remained well within the sanctioned $1.2 billion — which is about the lowest anywhere. Time overrun in the strict sense is only by a year or two, despite the sanctions. A first-of-type aircraft of this degree of complexity has not been developed anywhere in the West or in Russia in less than two to three decades.

The F16 series that was inducted into the U.S. Air Force in 1975 is today at Mark 60. That is how aircraft of this level of complexity are improved after induction. That this imperative applies even more to the LCA has to be recognised.

It is for the Prime Minister and the Defence Minister to ensure that this effort is not belittled or scuttled, and that the LCA programme is given all-out support — as successive Prime Ministers have ensured for our atomic energy and space programmes.

(Ashok Parthasarathi was Science Adviser to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Vice- Admiral (retired) Raman Puri was Chief of Integrated Defence Staff to the Chairman, Committee of Service Chiefs, remaining closely involved with the inter-service weapons acquisition process from October 2003 to February 2006).