New Delhi: PM Narendra Modi held a detailed meeting to deliberate the potential reforms to ensure a robust and self-reliant defence industry in India that caters to short and long term needs of the armed forces and initiatives to give a boost to the economy in the backdrop of COVID-19. The discussions involved reforming of the functioning of the Ordnance factories, streamlining procurement procedures, focused resource allocation, encouraging R&D/innovation, attracting investment in critical defence technologies and promotion of exports.
PM laid emphasis on positioning India among the top countries of the world in Defence and Aerospace sectors, from design to production, with active participation of public and private sector fulfilling the twin objectives of self-reliance & exports. He reviewed the proposed reforms for attracting domestic and foreign investment in defence sector.
It was discussed that defence expenditure be economized and the savings be channelised for strategic defence capital acquisition. Issues relating to defence procurement processes, offset policies, indigenization of spares, transfer of technology, attracting global OEMs to establish manufacturing facilities in India, expanding our presence in international supply chains, etc were also deliberated. For India to emerge as a global leader in defence manufacturing, focus on the export of quality and state-of-the-art equipment/systems/platforms has also been emphasised.
PM directed that India should reduce dependence on imports and take forward “Make in India” to build its domestic capabilities for designing, developing and manufacturing state-of-the-art defence equipment. He emphasized on initiatives to promote export of defence products along with industry participation in global defence product value chain and to create an environment that encourages R&D, rewards innovation, creates Indian IP ownership.
The meeting was attended by the Defence Minister, the Home Minister, the Finance Minister and Minister of State for Finance along with senior officials of the Government of India.
PM Modi holds a meeting to discuss ways to boost Coal & Mining sector
PM Narendra Modi held a detailed meeting to deliberate the potential economic reforms in Mines and Coal Sectors to give a boost to the economy in the backdrop of COVID-19. The discussions involved ensuring easy & abundant availability of mineral resources from domestic sources, upscaling exploration, attracting investment and modern technology, to generate large scale employment through transparent and efficient processes.
Auctioning of additional blocks, encouraging wider participation in auctions, increasing the production of mineral resources, reducing the cost of mining and cost of transporting, increasing ease of doing business while also reducing carbon footprint with environmentally sustainable development also formed important part of the discussions.
The issues related to reforms in auction structure, efficient institutional arrangements, participation of private sector in exploration and mining, making public sector more competitive as well as broad-basing the community development activities through the Mineral Development Fund were also deliberated. Expanding and improving evacuation infrastructure for minerals including use of sea-routes for domestic supplies was also considered.
The aspects related to increasing the efficient and environmentally sound first mile connectivity for coal transport from mines to railway sliding, automatic loading on rail wagons, coal gasification and liquification, coal bed methane exploration were also discussed for potential reforms.
PM Narendra Modi reviewed the contribution of Mines sector in increasing employment opportunities and boosting growth.
PM laid special focus on improving country’s self reliance in production of minerals and their in-country processing. He added that the mineral sector should benchmark its operations to international standards and advised them to prepare an action plan. He exhorted using modern technologies for efficient mining. He also directed to aim for reducing delays in obtaining clearances and partnering with states to facilitate increase in private investment to boost the economy. He gave directions to target thermal coal import substitution particularly when a huge coal stock inventory is available in the country this year.
