Addressing the inaugural General Bipin Rawat Memorial Lecture here on the occasion of his birth anniversary former IAF chief RKS Bhadauria on Wednesday (March 16) said, the time has come for the private sector industry to be given a level playing field along with public sector units to help the country produce indigenous weapon systems.
“General Rawat was a big advocate of self-reliance. He would say that in case of war, we will be able to win only through indigenous weapons. He also stressed that private sector industry should be given a level playing field along with the public sector units to help the country produce indigenous weapon systems for the country,” he said in his address.
The former Chief of Air Staff called for the need to set defined goals for the country to become self reliant in the defence sector.
“To my mind, the most critical area is to understand what do we really want and what should we aim at and then ultimately be able to define what is required to achieve Atmanirbharta (self reliant). “I don’t think so there will be any one today who will not agree with need and importance of Atmanirbharta but what do we want from Atmanirbharta as far as defence is concerned, is what we need to define. I believe it is the ability to do entire design and development which should be our next phase towards self reliance,” he said.
ACM Bhadauria also said a lot of things needs to be done in all areas that are critical in terms of technology and added, “This is critical as we go forward, the ability to do everything on your own. You have designed an equipment but imported certain products. There should be no chip working without your knowledge. If we have achieved this, we have achieved a huge step of self reliance in equipment and design. Be it testing and certification, we need to target what we have to achieve and in testing and certification is important to steer any conflict of interest….we must treat our testing ad certification agencies as national assets,” he said.
Gen Bipin Rawat was India’s first Chief of Defence Staff who tragically died with his wife and 11 other armed forces personnel in December when his military helicopter crashed near Coonoor in Tamil Nadu.
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