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Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has formed a nine-member expert committee under Prof. K. VijayRaghavan on the instructions of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the goal of reorganising the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).
The committee’s task is to review and redefine the department’s role and submit a report within three monthsProf. Vijay Raghavan, a former principal scientific advisor to the Indian government, played a key role in establishing the National Research Foundation (NRF).
The DRDO review committee’s other members are :
- Gen. (Ret.) Subrata Saha, a former deputy chief of the army staff,
- Vice Admiral S. N. Ghormade, a former vice chief of the navy staff,
- Air Marshal B. R. Krishna,
- A former chief of the integrated staff, Sujan R. Chinoy,
- director general of MP-IDSA, Professor Manindra Agarwal of IIT Kanpur,
- P. Shukla, President SIDM,
- D. Patil from Larsen and Toubro, Defence
- Dr S Unnikrishnan Nair, Distinguished Scientist, ISRO, and
- Rasika Chaube, a financial advisor for the Ministry of Defence.
DRDO Chief Samir V Kamat briefed the committee members that the decision of Minister Rajnath Singh and that the committee’s terms of purpose were as follows:
- Increase the involvement of MSME, start-ups, and academics in the creation of cutting-edge technology.
- The Department of Defence (R &D) and DRDO’s roles, as well as its interactions with academics and industry, need to be reorganised and clarified.
- Use NRI/foreign consultant knowledge and international partnerships to build innovative and game-changing defence technology.
- Use an appropriate system of incentives and disincentives, along with strong performance accountability, to recruit and keep high-quality personnel, particularly project-based workforce, and to filter out underperformers.
- Rationalisation of lab structure and performance assessment procedure.
- Modernise administrative, human resources, and finance systems to speed up project implementation.
- Use NRI/foreign consultant knowledge and international partnerships to build innovative and game-changing defence technology.
As the PM oneself expressed concern about the lack of accountability and delayed research in the organisation that typically operates as a government PSU and views the entire defence processes from research to development to production as its very own fiefdom, the Modi government’s decision to review the DRDO’s operations and the entire defence research and production eco-system was eagerly anticipated.
The DRDO has frequently acted as a barrier in defence acquisitions because it was developing the exact product that was being imported and in the name of indigenization, rather than being supportive of the private sector and aiding in the best procurement of hardware platforms for the Indian Armed Forces.
Among many others, unmanned aerial vehicles and anti-tank guided missiles are two classic examples. However, the DRDO has also made some ground-breaking advancements in guided missile systems.
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