IDN TAKE: Justifying India's Defence Spending

India is bordered by two hostile nuclear neighbours, Pakistan and China. They are both staunch allies and make no bones about it, in fact China is investing heavily into Pakistan because of its strategic location which is the most easy gateway to the Central Asian Republics which is rich in natural resources and energy and in turn stonewall to contain India's access in that region.

India's defense spending has been increasing at a decent rate every year even though it is said that the money allocated for MoD is not sufficient to counter the threats faced by India. In 2016 union budget for defense allocation was $51 billion USD which is around 2.25% of India's GDP.

Allocations for national defence were pegged at Rs 2,49,099 Crore - a marginal increase of less than 1.2% from last year’s Budget estimates (Rs 2,46,727 Crore), but a modest increase of 9.8% from revised estimates (Rs 2,24,636 crore). Revenue expenditure rose from revised Rs 1,43,236 crore (against estimates of Rs 1,52,139 crore in FY16) to Rs 1,62,759 crore. Capital expenditure, estimated at Rs 94,588 crore last year, which was revised at Rs 81,400 crore, got a meagre increase to touch Rs 86,340 crore this year.

A preliminary comparison between this year’s Budget estimates with last year’s revised estimates is mere indicative, but a trend analysis of last 10 years suggests fluctuating assessments on resources allocations. For example, revenue expenses have grown at an expected pace of about 11% per annum, but capital expenses have grown exponentially for the very simple reason that massive purchase orders of military equipment have been placed for modernisation purposes in the past few years. Revenue expenditure has increased by nearly Rs. 20,000 Crore.

Many say that India is unnecessarily spending money on defense while the same can be used to eradicate poverty and enrich the lives of millions of poor Indians. However, I beg to disagree. Yes, of course money should be spent for eradicating poverty but not at the cost of national security & pubic safety. India has a fast growing economy and is also being recognized globally as a regional power or if not as an emerging global Super Power, therefore, India must spend a substantial amount of its budget to bolster its defense preparedness to cater to its seeming threat perceptions but also in the bargain to address her quest for global power status.

China in a couple of decades will become a true superpower. It is already the second largest economy in the world. It's GDP is 10 trillion dollars while India's is 2.03 trillion dollars. Thus China comfortably spends more on defense to secure its regional and global interests. India and China have border disputes in Arunachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir  states with China. China is slowly trying to make the Indian ocean it's backyard and rapidly ramping up it's navy. It has nearly 300 ships and 62 submarines while India has 147 warships and 13 submarines. Since 90% of our trade is via the maritime route and it is important to protect our sea lanes or else during war the Chinese navy can choke India's shipping routes which will lead to economic crisis. So India has to rapidly build it's navy. Even though we have advantage of Andaman and Nicobar islands and we can easily block Malacca strait, the main trade route of China, but we still lag in some areas.

Coming to Air force, India's AF is fast depleting down to 32 sqaudrons (17 or 18 jets per sqaudron) from the sanctioned 44. China's air force is bigger in number.China is inducting indigineously developed chengdu j-11, j-10 aircrafts and is also under the process of building its fifth generation fighter. We cannot sustain a two front war( pakistan and china) because we dont have enough number of aircrafts. Thus there is an urgent need to buy or make more aircrafts for IAF

Along the LAC (line of actual control) that divides India and China, China has better infrastructure (roads, runways, rail network etc.,) while india lags way behind. But the new government has taken steps to address these issues. Its developing more roads along the borders for easier deployment of troops. Chinese army is twice the size of ours. The Indian Army is 1.1 million strong. But war over land will not last long as the terrain is mountainous which is very treacherous and difficult to navigate. India's Mountain strike corps which has a strength of around 35,000 personnel is being raised to counter China hegemony. The critical M777 howitzers are being inducted to contain Chinese army in case of an invasion.

Thus, China has more number of ships, aircrafts, ships and submarines. But they dont have any war experience, India armed forces has. We can choke the malacca strait during war and bring down the economy of China as its economy is dependent on trade. Quality of Chinese equipments are not known. Thus India must increase its inventory of armed forces soon.

The GDP of Pakistan is 296 billion USD (interestingly it is equal Mumbai's GDP). There is not much to tell about Pakistan armed forces. They are numerically and technologically weaker than India's in all aspects. Air Chief Marshall Arup Raha said that IAF can make Pakistan vanish in two days time if orders are given to attack it.

Pakistan army strength is about 6 lakh strong and PAF has around 500 aircrafts which comprises of  a few JF-17 'Thunders' which is of vintage pedigree and no match for the more modern and potent airborne assets of India. As the adage goes, proof of the pudding lies in its eating, Pakistan rather tamely pulled out of the recently concluded Bahrain Air Show as the Pakistani jet was earlier slated to compete with the more capable TEJAS, this may have been done at the behest of China, mainly to save face as once proven of its dubious capabilities against the genuine 4++ Tejas fighter, China will find it difficult to sell the JF-17's to prospective customers both the Asian & African continents.

The Indian Army can easily push itself into Pakistan if a political decision is made, however Pakistan on the other hand to save its territory will try to use its China sourced tactical nuclear weapons against an advancing Indian Army. But, a point to bare in mind is a fact that Pakistan is never going to be a big threat to India either now or even in the foreseeable future as it is economically and militarily much weaker than India.

Thus, these are the above reasons for which India's defence spending can be justified.