Rs 4 Lakh Crore for ‘Buy Indian’ in past 5 years

New Delhi: In the last five financial years, from 2014-15 to 2018-19, Ministry of defence has accorded 'Acceptance of Necessity' (AoN) to 204 proposals for defence production worth Rs 4,04,880 Crore approximately under ‘Buy (Indian-IDDM)’, ‘Buy (Indian)’, ‘Buy and Make (Indian)’, ‘Strategic Partnership Model’ or ‘Make’ categories of capital procurement as per Defence Procurement Procedure (DPP) – 2016. The Request for Proposal (RFP) in all these projects has been issued only to Indian Vendors, Minister of State (Defence) Shripad Nayak told Loksabha on Wednesday.

Buy Indian-IDDM (Indigenously Designed, Developed and Manufactured) is a new category of procurement that was introduced in 2016 under defence procurement procedure (DPP) to promote indigenous design and development of defence equipment. "Government has taken special measures to promote new and innovative defence production projects under the “Make in India” programme," said the minister in the parliament. FDI Policy has been revised to allow FDI under automatic route upto 49% and beyond 49% through Government approval for technology acquisition etc, he added.

Apart from IDDM, ‘Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX)’ was launched in April 2018 to create an ecosystem to foster innovation and technology development in Defence and Aerospace by engaging Industries including MSMEs, Start-ups, Individual Innovators, R&D institutes and Academia including grants/fund.

"Government has taken special measures like Buy Indian-IDDM, Innovations for Defence Excellence and 'Make' category  to promote new and innovative defence production projects under the “Make in India” programme"- Shripad Nayak, Minister of State (Defence)

The ‘Make’ Procedure has been simplified with provisions for funding of 90% of development cost by the Government to Indian industry and reserving Government-funded Make-I projects not exceeding development cost of Rs. 10 Crore & procurement cost Rs. 50 Crores per year for MSMEs.  Industry-funded Make-II projects not exceeding the development cost of Rs. 3 Crore & procurement cost Rs. 50 Crores per year have also been reserved for MSMEs. A separate procedure for ‘Make-II’ category has been notified to encourage indigenous development and manufacture of defence equipment including provisions such as relaxation of eligibility criterion, minimal documentation, provision for considering proposals suggested by industry/individual etc.