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Narratives for eyeballs
The union budget 2025-26 was presented on Saturday, 01 Feb 2025. But surprise of surprises, there are more AI experts (like me too?) on the Indian digital media than are economic experts, thanks to Deepseek.
In 2019, Electronics and Radar Development Agency (LRDE) – a DRDO lab – diversified and part of the lab, transformed to another entity, Centre for artificial intelligence and Robotic (CAIR), located in Bangalore. The other day I heard the Director DRDO say that there are now ten centers of excellence employing and developing AI tools in various DRDO labs. ChatGpt like applications is only one area of AI which the public is able to access freely and usefully employ for personal uses. AI is also employed in the specific areas of Finance, Marketing, Agriculture, Robotics, Defense etc
Yet, it is a fact that in India that is Bharath, the “experts” and commentators and media ventilate on melas, religions, castes, failed theft in an actor’s house, insignificant podcasts. calling politicians names, getting worked up on electoral political rhetoric and fill social media with agenda-based forwards. Elected representatives stall house proceedings citing frivolous reasons. Meanwhile the world moves on. The nation is unable to catch up and forever remains a laggard democracy, growing old before getting rich.
Research and development
One of the main factors the Nation is failing is on technology (can’t make engines for planes, ships and submarines) due to its inadequate and lackadaisical approach to Research and development of new technologies. The private sector and academia do not do enough in the area of R&D.
Gross domestic expenditure on research and development (GERD) is a measure of a country’s total investment in research and development (R&D). It’s used as an indicator of R&D activity and trends in R&D spending. According to recent data, the United States spends significantly more on R&D than India, with the US spending an estimated $885.6 billion in 2022 compared to India’s much lower expenditure, which is around 65 billion USD in the same year; highlighting a large gap between the two nations in research and development spending. Other top R&D performers include China ($458,5 billion), Japan ($177.4 billion), Germany ($153.7 billion), South Korea ($119.6 billion), the United Kingdom ($97.8 billion), and France ($77.2 billion). The figures are total spending by all agencies – government, private and universities.
Here is an interesting graph on what the share of governments and the private sector on R &D, taken out of the economic survey report presented to the parliament by the Government on 31 January 2025.
Even in the area of IT, while the nation excels in services, over decades, it has not offered a single world class product – not even an App. The graph tells a real tale of the monumental apathy on R&D, especially from the private sector in these past years.
To modernise its armed forces and reduce dependency on external dependence for defence procurement, several initiatives have been taken by the government to encourage ‘Make in India’ activities via policy support initiatives.
Way to go
The Indian Army aims to finalize the contract for procuring 307 Advanced Towed Artillery Gun System (ATAGS) platforms—indigenously developed, state-of-the-art 155mm howitzers—at an estimated cost of Rs 8,000 crore by March 2025, Army Chief General Upendra Dwivedi announced on Monday during his annual press conference ahead of Army Day, observed on January 15. “If all goes as planned, we aim to sign the ATAGS contract before the end of this financial year,” General Dwivedi stated.
In November, Kalyani Group’s Bharat Forge began contract negotiations with the Ministry of Defense (MoD) for 307 ATAGS platforms. “After completion of the due technical evaluation process and commercial bids opening, the contract negotiation procedure between Bharat Forge Ltd and the Indian Ministry of Defense is currently underway,” the company informed the stock exchange
A robust defense industry is mandatory for a country like India for self-sufficiency in defense and simultaneously uplift the local economy … All major developed economies have a robust defense industry of its own.
A robust indigenous defense industry improves balance of payment, increases foreign exchange reserves, creates jobs and above all establishes self reliance, it takes a long time to achieve quality and self-reliance. But we can’t reach the top by forever sitting at the bottom.
Yes, we have to establish a pan India culture, to include Universities, DRDO and industry for R&D of technologies. For example, if we had a robust R&D on metallurgy (most important for weapons, ships and aircrafts) we could have probably made our own guns, aero engines etc. long back. The much awaited revamping of DRDO, I believe, is underway.
Maybe a beginning has been made. India has a long way to go to be there among the top defense manufacturing nations. We have to start sometime, somewhere and stop comparing India’s capabilities with that of advanced countries in every discussion and discourse.
(The author is an Indian Army veteran and a contemporary affairs commentator. The views are personal. He can be reached at kl.viswanathan@gmail.com )
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