India obscenely boosts defence capabilities

The Defence Minister of India – Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) Rajnath Singh – celebrated that Indian defence exports had touched a new all-time high with a record 38,424 crore rupees ($4.4 billion), an 63% annual increase.

The BJP’s defence boast is meant to ease concerns about India’s ballooning current account deficit, particularly as Modi’s western pivot to Trump and Netanyahu faces growing opposition from the public.

According to the BJP, Indian defence exports are now reaching the United States, Israel, the UAE, Australia, and Japan. Indian-made defence electronics are being exported to the US, UK, and France. Bulletproof jackets from India are being supplied to Australia, Japan, Israel, and Brazil. Ammunition is reaching the UAE, Egypt, Indonesia, and Thailand.

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recent report by KPMG India pushed India to adopt Israel’s approach to defence exports if it wants to sustain the momentum and break into the global top tier. It suggested India should have a similar centralised export agency like Israel’s SIBAT.

Israel, with a much lower annual defence spend compared to India, has emerged as one of the key defence export hubs of the world and as per the SIPRI report of 2019, it ranks 8 in terms of defence exports. A major reason for its emergence as a defence manufacturing and export hub has been the establishment of SIBAT, a dedicated directorate under the Israeli Ministry of Defence (IMoD), that looks after promotion of defence exports and participates in the formulation of Israel’s defence export policy.

India is still mostly importing

India is still the world’s second-largest arms importer, but its imports have dropped slightly by 4 per cent. Russia used to supply 70 per cent of India’s weapons a decade ago. That has now fallen to 40 per cent, according to SIPRI.

Ukraine is the world’s largest arms importer.

India is now buying more from Western countries instead, given Modi’s capitulation to Netanyahu and Trump.

Israel’s Jerusalem Post recently featured a segment on India’s ties with Israel. Dr Lauren Dagan Amos said that “they want to learn lessons from that because what Israel did in Gaza, they want to do in Pakistan. That is the rationale.”

She explained that the relationship started with urgent operational needs and mutual interests. Over time, it moved beyond simple sales into co-development, co-production, and long-term maintenance within India.

She added that the Indian industry is now treated as a full partner, not just a customer.

BJP’s defence boast is to assuage underlying tensions

With oil prices rising due to the Iran war, India’s current account deficit is widening. It could reach 2.5 per cent of GDP in the coming fiscal year, according to Bloomberg.

Despite Modi’s western lurch, there are people in India who are on Iran’s side against “Yankee imperialism and zionist criminality.”

Mani Shankar Aiyar, a former Indian diplomat, said:

I am sure Iran can give a befitting answer to the needless aggression to which they have been subjected by a combination of Yankee imperialism and zionist criminality.

Modi’s Trump connection is being questioned in South Asia, similar to the blowback being experienced by other right-wing leaders like Starmer and Italy’s Meloni.

As Rahul Gandhi recently noted, Narendra Modi’s future is in Trump’s hands.

Featured image via the Canary