NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi-led Government has cleared 41 pending defence proposals in the past six months of its governance at the Centre.
In a reply to the Rajya Sabha, defence minister Manohar Parrikar on Tuesday claimed that “a total of 41 proposals for an indicative cost of `1,19,719.53 crore have been cleared by the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) since June 2014.”
The Defence Ministry, in its three DAC meetings, two headed by the Arun Jaitley and then one by Manohar Parrikar, took crucial decisions on the modernisation of the Armed Forces, which include proposals to procure artillery guns for the Army, six new submarines, anti-tank guided missiles systems from Israel and Dornier surveillance aircraft etc.
During the tenure of the Congress-led UPA Government, the then Defence Minister A K Antony, despite holding the Defence Ministry for a record tenure, failed to meet the requirement of the Armed Forces which dented the defence preparedness.
“A large number of defence equipment have been/are being manufactured in India using Transfer of Technology (TOT).
Parrikar’s predecessor Jaitley, in his two DAC meets, cleared the maximum projects. Jaitley, in his first DAC in August, cleared project of over `17,000 crore, while in the second meet, cleared a whopping `80,000 crore-worth projects which include big ticket deal of six new submarines.