India is continuing to bolster its national defense industry, as highlighted by the Ministry of Defense’s recent decision to procure 287 billion rupees ($3.6 billion) worth of domestically made weapons and other defense equipment.

The approved items, which are expected to augment India’s military’s capabilities amid long-standing tensions with neighboring China and Pakistan, include extended-range guided rockets and area denial munitions capable of neutralizing tanks and armored personnel carriers.

Also included is the command version of India’s infantry combat vehicle, which can collect, disseminate and share real-time information with commanders.

To enhance the protection and equipment of soldiers deployed along the country’s disputed border with Pakistan, the ministry will also buy improved body armor sets as well as 400,000 locally built close-quarter-battle (CQB) carbines for use in counter-terrorism operations.

Moreover, New Delhi plans to increase the army’s use of modern technologies by acquiring both autonomous surveillance and armed drone swarms.

Indian industry is also set to provide upgraded 1250KW marine gas turbines for the navy’s locally designed Kolkata-class guided missile destroyers and build 14 fast patrol vessels for the Indian Coast Guard, with 60% of the components coming from local sources

These indigenous procurements are the latest examples of New Delhi’s “Make in India” initiative, which is designed to reduce the country’s defense imports and render it increasingly self-reliant by boosting the local production of platforms and systems.

To achieve this, New Delhi has been gradually expanding a list of defense items it says can no longer be imported. Last Saturday, for instance, the Indian Parliament added 18 more items to that list, including light-weight tanks, 127 mm naval guns, stand-off airborne jammers, communication systems and multirole helicopters.

Rahul Bedi, a New Delhi-based defense analyst, says the move has often resulted in the defense ministry scrapping plans to acquire weapons and other military equipment from overseas manufacturers it had been collaborating with for many years.

“The 127 mm guns were expected to be acquired from BAE Systems and the multirole helicopters from Airbus for both the Indian Navy and the Indian Coast Guard. The defense ministry was also looking at Russia to source lightweight tanks, but no orders are likely to be placed because of this approach to source them indigenously.”

In May, New Delhi also decided against signing a multimillion dollar repeat order it had approved in late 2020 for 72,400 assault rifles from the U.S. company Sig Sauer.

Another deal expected to be terminated is the one with Abu Dhabi-based small arms manufacturer Caracal for the supply of almost 94,000 CQB carbines. “Presumably, the recent approval for sourcing these carbines indigenously will automatically lead to cancellation of the Caracal order.”

That said, India could theoretically still proceed with this and other deals should the Indian military categorize them as “one-off” purchases required to meet urgent operational needs, explained Bedi.

Meanwhile, the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is also using the Make in India initiative to promote defense exports, with New Delhi setting a foreign sales target of 350 billion rupees ($4.38 billion) by 2025.

The government recently announced that Indian defense exports reached 130 billion rupees in the 2021-22 fiscal year, 70% of which came from the country’s burgeoning private sector.

“A major portion of these exports — mainly to the United States — comprise components and sub-assemblies manufactured locally under a transfer of technology for Apache and Chinook helicopters and C-130J transport aircraft,” Bedi said.

However, the analyst pointed out that several items are being categorized as “indigenous” even though they are the result of collaborations between Indian companies and foreign vendors, the latter of which provide power packs, avionics and weapon systems, among other equipment and components.

For example, platforms such as the Tejas Light Combat Aircraft, Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopter, Arjun main battle tank and the supersonic BrahMos cruise missile are classified as indigenous, despite each of them having an average import content of over 50%, Bedi added.