Drone: Hindustan Times reports that India will buy 31 drones from the United States. A decision to this effect was taken by Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), which is headed by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.
The Union Government is expected to greenlight this decision during PM Modi’s state visit to the United States. DAC is the highest decision-making body in the Defence Ministry.
According to informed sources, 31 drones would be purchased from the United States, and these would be deployed to monitor India’s land and sea borders. The land-specific drones would be specifically deployed to look at India’s northern borders adjoining Pakistan and China.
The sources specified that the 31 drones would not be distributed evenly to all the arms of the Indian defence forces. Rather, the use of these drones would be determined by a tr-service command.
“The mission-specific roles will be defined by the three operational centres under the guidance of the future theatre commanders and the permanent chairman of the chiefs of staff committee,” Hindustan Times says.
Currently, Indian Navy operates two Sea Guardian drones on lease from General Atomics. Indian Army also has o reasonable experience in operating a high-altitude long endurance drone with 40-hour endurance.
Phased absorption
Sources told Hindustan Times that there would be a phased absorption of these weapon systems. Initially, India would acquire 10 drones, and buy missiles and other weapons at a later date.
All these drones would be capable of carrying India-made munition.
$3 billion deal
This would be a $3 billion deal between the US and India. It is noteworthy that this deal would have a fair amount of Indian localization and will be executed on a government-to-government basis.
Many observers are of the view that Mr Modi’s state visit to the US would also result in India buying GE engines for its fighter aircraft.
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