The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), chaired by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, on Monday accorded preliminary approval, the Acceptance of Necessity (AoN), for capital acquisition proposals of the armed forces amounting to Rs. 76,390 crore.

“This will provide substantial boost to the Indian Defence Industry and reduce foreign spending significantly,” a Defence Ministry statement said. “For the Army, the DAC accorded fresh AoNs for procurement of rough terrain fork lift trucks, bridge laying tanks, wheeled armoured fighting vehicles with anti-tank guided missiles and weapon locating radars through domestic sources with emphasis on indigenous design and development,” it said.

For the Navy, AoN was accorded for the procurement of Next Generation Corvettes (NGC) at an estimated cost of approximately Rs. 36,000 crore.

The Ministry stated: “These NGCs will be versatile platforms for variety of roles viz. surveillance missions, escort operations, deterrence, surface action group operations, search & attack and coastal defence.”

These NGCs would be constructed based on the Navy’s new in-house design using the latest technology in ship-building and would contribute to further the government’s SAGAR (Security and Growth for all in the Region) initiative, it noted.

The DAC also accorded AoNs for the manufacture of Dornier aircraft and Su-30 MKI aero-engines by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited focussed on enhancing indigenisation, particularly in indigenising aero-engine material.

A ‘Digital Coast Guard’ project under ‘Buy (Indian) Category’ has also been approved by the DAC. Under this project, a secure pan India network for digitising various surface and aviation operations, logistics, finance and human resources processes in Coast Guard will be established, the statement added.

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