3-Aug-2017: India’s first private missile production facility unveiled in Hyderabad.
India’s first private sector missile sub-systems manufacturing facility, a joint venture between Kalyani Group and Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defence Systems Ltd., was recently inaugurated near Hyderabad.
Formed in line with the ‘Make in India’ initiative of the Centre and the policy to encourage private sector participation in defence production, the 51:49 joint venture will develop a wide range of advanced capabilities.
To begin with, the Kalyani Rafael Advanced Systems (KRAS) plant will make anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) Spike. Besides supplying to the Indian Army, the plan is to export to South East Asian countries. Make in India: Make in India campaign aims to draw in organizations from around the globe to manufacture and invest in India. The campaign concentrates on facilitating job creation, enforcement to the tertiary and secondary sector, boosting the national economy, making India a self-reliant nation and ensuring that the Indian economy gets international acknowledgement.
The essential target of the campaign is to draw in ventures from over the globe and reinforce India’s assembling segment. It is being driven by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India. Under the ‘Make in India’ initiative, the government has, in the last one year, announced several steps to improve the business environment by easing processes to do business in the country, and attract foreign investments.
9-Jan-2020: Army to work on Government Owned Contractor Operated model to improve efficiency
The Army has initiated the process of identifying potential industry partners to implement the Government Owned Contractor Operated (GOCO) model for its base workshops and ordnance depots intended to improve operational efficiency.
A Request For Information (RFI) was issued to shortlist service providers with experience in “warehousing, logistics and supply chain management” for Central Ordnance Depot (COD), Kanpur. Separately, the Army’s Master General of Ordnance (MGO) began evaluating the GOCO model for Army Base Workshops (ABWs) to drive “higher operational efficiencies” and PricewaterhouseCoopers Pvt. Ltd. (PwC) hired as a consultant to run this engagement is scheduled to hold conferences and consultations with the industry.
The agenda of these interactions would be to understand from interested industry participants their views on opportunities envisaged and issues/concerns if ABW(s) were to be run under GOCO model. The last date to send responses is January 10.
The eight ABWs identified are located in Delhi, Jabalpur (Madhya Pradesh), Kankinara (West Bengal), Allahabad, Agra and Meerut (Uttar Pradesh), Kirkee near Pune and Bengaluru.
The tasks undertaken by these workshops include depot level (D level) repairs and overhaul of T-72 and T-90, guns, mortars and small arms, vehicles, communication systems, radars, air defence systems, armoured personnel carriers and manufacture of spares (indigenisation) and overhaul of aviation rotables.
The GOCO model was one of the recommendations of the Lt. Gen. DB Shekatkar (Retd.) committee to “enhance combat capability and re-balancing defence expenditure.” Based on the recommendations, the government has “decided to disband two advance base workshops, one static workshop and four ordnance depots” and eight ABWs are recommended to be corporatised on GOCO model.
The RFI dated December 19, 2019 aims “to shortlist Service Providers of repute with experience in warehousing, logistics and supply chain management and the last date for submitting responses “will be six weeks from the date of posting of the RFI.”
The selected Service Provider will take over present infrastructure and related services from COD Kanpur on “as-it-is-and-where-it-is basis. Maintenance of complete infrastructure will be thereafter the responsibility of the service provider. The existing civilian manpower/workforce will have to be absorbed by the selected Service Provider. The functions of COD Kanpur envisaged for outsourcing under the GOCO model include warehousing operations, transportation of stores and area maintenance.
The service provider should be an Indian registered company with at least 10 years of working experience in related domains and have an average annual turnover of ₹50 crore for each of the last three financial years.
The total range of inventory of COD Kanpur is about 4045 items and on an average holds approximately 70,000 tonnes of stores at any given point of time. It consists of different types of clothing, footwear, headgear and tentage items, camping items, kitchen equipment and supply dropping equipment.
13-Feb-2019: Restructuring and Privatisation Policy
The Government had constituted an Expert Committee on enhancing combat capability and re-balancing defence expenditure under chairmanship of Lt. General DB Shekatkar (Retd). On the basis of recommendations of the Committee, the Government has decided to disband two Advance Base Workshops, one Static Workshop and four ordnance depots. Also, eight Army Base Workshops are recommended to be corporatized on Government Owned Contractor Operated (GOCO) model. The above decisions have been taken in the overall interest of the Army and the Nation.
The functioning of different organizations including defence workshops has been reviewed and interaction held from time to time with stakeholders.
A decision has been taken in the Ministry to declare 275 items produced by Ordnance Factories as non-core, as these items can be easily procured by the Users from private players. No retrenchment of employees would take place as a result of this decision and the available manpower will be re-trained and re-skilled on voluntary basis to work in core areas of production as per their changed specialization.
4-Nov-2019: India, Russia to conclude mutual logistics agreement
India and Russia are expected to conclude a mutual logistics agreement and review the setting up of joint ventures for manufacturing spares for Russian defence platforms in India during the visit of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh to Moscow from November 5 to 7.
Moscow sent a draft ARLS early last year and discussions have been on since. Earlier, it was expected to be signed during the meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Vladimir Putin in September on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) in Vladivostok, but was held back.
Logistics agreements are administrative arrangements facilitating access to military facilities for exchange of fuel and provisions on mutual agreement when the Indian military is operating abroad.
Mr. Singh will co-chair the 19th India-Russia Inter-Governmental Commission on Military and Military Technical Cooperation with his Russian counterpart, General Sergei Shoigu. Another major issue on the agenda will be the purchase of the S-400 air-defence missile systems, over which the U.S. is continuing a tough stance with respect to waiver from sanctions under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act. The deliveries are expected to begin by 2020-end, 24 months after the signing of the contract, and that is when the sanctions are expected to kick in.
A 50-member industry delegation is accompanying Mr. Singh to Russia to explore ways to jointly manufacture spares and components with Russian original equipment manufacturers (OEM) under ‘Make in India’. The delegation to Russia is a follow-up of the Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) signed on September 4 by India and Russia to operationalize a mechanism for collaboration on joint manufacturing of spare parts, components, aggregates and other products for the maintenance of Russian-origin arms and defence equipment in India under the ‘Make in India’ programme through the transfer of technology and setting up of joint ventures.