On big ticket defence acquisitions, let’s adopt a collegiate system

Defence capital acquisitions are tricky, complicated, and a consuming process. While the average time frame for processing such cases may be 3.5 years, many cases take much more time from conceptualisation to finalisation. Therefore, the Ministry of Defence (MoD)’s policy resolve, reiterated by the Additional Secretary and Director General Acquisition on September 28, to reduce this pendency to two years average would be a win-win situation for the vendors, and the armed forces, since it would prevent consequential cost escalation, and facilitate force modernisation and capability development.

However, while procedural reforms such as the revised Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020 are already ushered in, the intended acquisition cycle would still be challenged by organisational obstacles.

Defence acquisitions for capital procurements are supposed to kick-in immediately after approval in principal is accorded by the high-powered Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) in the MoD. Plenty of homework is already done in every single acquisition case before they are formally put up before the DAC.

These involve advance planning for the case as part of 15 year Long Term Perspective Plan (LTPP), now replaced by the 10 year Integrated Capability Development Plan (ICDP), and the Technology Perspective and Capacity Roadmap (TPCR), apart from being part of the five year Defence Capital Acquisition Plan (DCAP) and the two year Annual Acquisition Plan (AAP) for better resource commitment. The armed forces, as users or customers of the intended weapons system, are aware about the generational advantage of the weapons system, and diligently work out their service-specific quantitative and qualitative requirements. All stakeholders are also familiar about the proposed procurement plan.

Yet, if the defence acquisition cases get delayed beyond tolerable limit, there are many organisational reasons for this.

First, defence is a specialised and technical subject. Many officers who come on deputation to the MoD under the Central Staffing System (CSS) as deputy secretaries, directors or even joint secretaries, do not have a background in the subject, and, therefore, take time to understand defence in general, and defence acquisition in particular. The desire to play ‘safe’ often makes them sit on decisions for an enormous time. Even then, they may not fully grasp the essence of bulky procurement files. Noble provisions in the DAP for knowledge-sharing notwithstanding, there are not much opportunities for these officers to familiarise themselves with the contextual background, and teleology of the weapons programme.

Second, the current defence acquisition system is based on file movement, as elsewhere in the Government of India. This system is tedious, time-taking, and does not engender confidence. While all stakeholders are supposed to adhere by stipulated timelines; in practice, there are sequential delays at every stage either due to paucity of functional knowledge, hesitation, flirting with allocation of business rules spirit, or simply bad file preparation!

Third, from a public policy perspective, every past capital procurement example could be a case study for learning lessons on time and cost escalation along with technology proliferation. Yet, these cases become part and parcel of our archival past without the learning lessons taken on record through a centralised data for polishing future acquisition proposals.

The policy proposal of reducing the acquisition time cycle warrants some tough choices for metamorphosis into actual deliverables. Should we adopt a corporate model for buying big ticket items? But then, many of the corporate practices in India militate against the time-tested system of procurement in the Government of India, and may not stand the expectational benchmarks set by the General Financial Rules of the Ministry of Finance or those related to tendering process by the CVC.

Inter alia, should we consider the oft-suggested integrated procurement body within the MoD with full financial powers? But then, even these could lead to financial indiscipline.

Probably, there is one solution that needs to be experimented without it violating any financial or vigilance benchmarks. This is about following a collegiate approach in defence procurement cases. Imagine a hypothetical scenario, where all stakeholders are put together in one room with full access to knowledge-sharing, discussion opportunities, and doubt clarification. The collegiate effort and ops-room situation may produce some definite progress in reducing time since different stakeholders often operate in silos, and in a compartmentalised atmosphere.

The MoD’s proposal of reducing the defence acquisition cycle harps upon a reality bite: we need to save on time for real value addition to India’s military capability building. Almost every defence acquisition case may have gathered dust for some extra time on most tables leading to cost revisions and dis-satisfaction among the armed forces.

Probably, it is time to adopt the collegiate approach for saving the precious penny in big ticket defence acquisitions.

Bhartendu Kumar Singh is in the Indian Defence Accounts Service.

Views are personal and do not represent the stand of this publication.