NEW DELHI: The Indian Navy's institutional approach towards the indigenisation and innovation is bearing fruits with more than 250 projects covering the design and development areas. This holds significance in keeping the supply chain issues plaguing the country's several military projects.
Sources told TNIE, "262 projects in the field of design and development are at various stages of staff evaluation, of which 171 projects have been contracted under iDEX (Innovation for Defence Excellence) scheme."
Also, the recently concluded DefConnect 4.0 saw a financial commitment of 132.5 crore to the Indian Navy's innovation efforts in a single launch of problem statements. Major equipment under indigenisation through 97 projects of TDF, Make and Revenue routes are accounting for about 850 crore, added source.
iDEX platform, under the aegis of the Department of Defence Production (DDP), Ministry of Defence, was launched in 2018. It aims to foster innovation & technology development in defence and aerospace by engaging innovators & entrepreneurs to deliver technologically advanced solutions for modernising the Indian Military.
The Technology Development Fund (TDF) scheme is a flagship programme of the Ministry of Defence executed by DRDO under 'Make in India' initiative.
The DefConnect is an event organised by iDEX bringing together the start-ups and the multifarious stakeholders: armed forces, innovators, start-ups, and industry leaders.The event aims to showcase cutting-edge technologies and foster collaboration among the stakeholders.
Indian Navy has been at the forefront since 1965 in focusing towards indigenisation of the design, and development as the leadership, said the sources believes in a robust indigenous industry which is crucial for sustaining an omnipresent blue-water force that the Indian Navy has evolved into.
"Disruption of global supply chains due to isolated conflicts and amorphous shift of geo-political alliances has served as a stark reminder, time and again of the need to be self-reliant from system-level down to the most singular component-level."
With changing dimensions of war, the cost of technology denial can be crippling. "Importing technology is not a sustainable option for a rising global force such as the Indian Navy, which is already a preferred security partner in the Indian Ocean Region.",
In order to remain a modern and combat-ready force, the Indian Navy has committed to be 100% self-reliant by pursuing indigenisation activities from component level upwards; and leapfrogging technology through various avenues. The approach of the Indian Navy encompasses the potential of the Indian Industry.
The Indian shipbuilding industry has come of age "with 63 out of 65 IN Ships under construction presently being built at Indian shipyards turning the Indian Navy into a Builder's Navy.
Talking about the overall growth in this regard, about 90, 60 and 50 % of indigenous content has been achieved in the aspects of Float, Move and Fight categories, respectively, sources added.
The float part includes Hull and its related fittings and components, Move includes the engine and whatever makes it move, Complete propulsions systems, associated machinery and auxiliaries. Fight, includes, sensors and weapons. The Indian Navy is now focussing its indigenisation efforts in the domains of propulsion, power generation, weapons and sensors.
The Indigenisation Units (IUs) at Visakhapatnam for ENC & ANC; and at Mumbai for WNC under the umbrella of Centre for Indigenisation & Self Reliance (CISR) at Coimbatore lead the 'bottom-up' approach of Indigenisation, catering to the indigenisation needs of field units. CISR has also reached out to and engaged with more than 30 industries to map their capability for specific indigenisation needs.
A dedicated indigenisation Roll-on Plan for 2023-26 is in force for progressing indigenisation of assembly, sub-assembly and components.
Under the Year On Year Roll-on Plans, about 5000 items have been indigenised so far. The indigenisation roadmaps for the foreign-origin IN Ships Vikramaditya, Talwar Class frigates, P-75 Scorpene submarines and Deepak - class tankers are already in place and progressing to replace the foreign-origin equipment on these platforms with Indian-made equipment over the next few years.
Combined with the sustained impetus on increasing the indigenous content in ships under construction; and the design and construction of ships within India, the shipbuilding industry is well poised to support the Indian Navy.
Over 9000 applications that the Armed Forces received for iDEX challenges, specifically from start-ups and MSME amply proves that there is growth in the defence eco-system.
With the IN expecting to ramp up the indigenous content across platforms, the items on the government's Positive Indigenisation Lists (PIL), items uploaded on the Srijan Portal, and those listed in the Indian Navy's Swavlamban document are markers for the industry to take up and contribute to defence production.
Also, in the process, the Indian Navy's Naval Innovation and Indigenisation Organisation (NIIO) Seminar, Swavlamban is scheduled on 28 and 29 October in New Delhi.
It is the 3rd edition, with the Indian Navy receiving more than 2000 proposals from the Indian industry that have been converted into 155 challenges to facilitate the development of prototypes. This initiative has enabled collaboration with more than 200 MSMEs/ Startups under the iDEX Scheme.
This year's edition has been expanded to include the achievements of sister services and CAPFs as well, fostering a wholesome defence innovation and indigenous collaborative ecosystem.