The Rs 40,000-crore defence challenge

Boosting defence exports requires a major emphasis change. Instead of focusing on low-value consumables such as ammunition, India needs to concentrate on high-value, complex combat platforms

Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi on Wednesday threw a challenge before the Indian aerospace and defence industry with his call to achieve an annual export target of Rs 40,000 crore. Neither is this resolve new, nor the figure. The aim of increasing defence exports more than 10-fold from the existing level of Rs 2,000-3,000 crore annually to over $5 billion (then Rs 35,000 crore), was first enunciated in the Defence Production Policy of 2018 (DPrP-2018). Mr Modi again made that call while addressing DefExpo 2020 in Lucknow. Helped by adding the export of civil aerospace products to that of defence