NEW DELHI: India on Saturday cleared long-delayed projects worth $13.1 billion to modernise the country’s ageing Soviet-era military hardware and boost its domestic defence industry.

The Defence Acquisition Council approved defence procurement proposals worth Rs800bn ($13.1bn), many of which were longstanding, at a meeting chaired by Defence Minister Arun Jaitley, the Press Trust of India said.

India is in the midst of a $100bn defence upgrade programme. It cleared proposals worth nearly $3.5bn in June.

India is the world’s largest arms importer with the US recently overtaking Russia as its biggest arms supplier. But slow procurement over decades and the collapse of a string of defence deals during the previous Congress party government’s rule has left the military short of key equipment, according to analysts. The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has been pushing for greater indigenisation of the military industry as India imports around 70 per cent of its defence hardware.

Published in Dawn, October 26th, 2014