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The NDA government has appointed a committee of experts to recommend measures to enhance the combat capabilities of the over 13-lakh strong armed forces and "Re-balance" the overall defence expenditure in view of the escalating salary and pension bills.

The 11-member committee led by Lt Gen D B Shekatkar (retd), which includes several other top military officers as well as civilian experts, has been given three months to chalk out an action plan.

"The overall aim is to ensure India's combat capabilities and potential are enhanced, with a better teeth-to-tail combat ratio, within budgetary constraints. The committee will hold its first meeting with defence minister Manohar Parrikar once he returns from his May 20-23 trip to Oman and UAE," said a source.

This comes a year after Parrikar first underlined the need to slash the non-operational "flab" of the Army, Navy and IAF after a detailed review to ensure leaner, meaner and cost-effective fighting forces, as was then reported by TOI.

Parrikar feels there is no option but to "downsize in areas which are not of operational importance", both in terms of manpower and infrastructure, due to budgetary limitations. PM Narendra Modi , too, has told top military commanders that instead of constantly trying to expand the size of their forces, they should focus on forces that are "agile, mobile and driven by technology".

While Parrikar stresses there will be no cuts in combat forces, he has repeatedly attacked the previous UPA regime for the "arbitrary way" in which it approved the raising of the Army's new 17 Mountain Strike Corps without any budgetary planning.

As reported by TOI earlier, the Army is being forced to dip into its critical war wastage reserves to raise the 17 Corps with 90,274 additional soldiers, which is meant for acquiring some land combat deterrence against China . As it is, the revenue component (day-to-day costs/salaries) in the defence budget by far outstrips the capital outlay every year, leaving very little for new modernisation projects for the armed forces.

Interestingly, the 1.18-million strong Army has also ordered a study, headed by a senior Lt-General, to determine ways to optimise manpower. "The Army has followed a policy of `save and raise' since the 1999 Kargil conflict to improve combat capabilities without manpower increases. With modernisation and induction of cutting-edge technologies, some more scope for manpower optimisation can be created," said an officer.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Subramanian Swamy on Friday said China was now ready to `favourably act` on terrorist Masood Azhar in the United Nations.

On Thursday, China had said it was in "close" contact with India over its efforts to put Masood Azhar on the UN list of proscribed terrorists.

Swamy informed about the development on Twitter today.

China's yesterday statement was in response to Indian President Pranab Mukherjee's remarks to state-run CCTV channel saying that Beijing joining hands with New Delhi in the fight against terrorism will have "its own impact".

Ahead of his State visit to China scheduled to take place between May 24 and 27, Mukherjee said, "India and China - both huge countries - multi-cultural, multi-racial - if they come together in fighting this menace, I am sure it will have its own impact.”

"And India always believes that every country should have a zero-tolerance policy towards terrorism and the fight is to be all out."

His comments assumed significance as it come against the backdrop of China recently blocking India's bid to put Masood Azhar on the UN list of proscribed terrorists, a move that has become a major irritant in Sino-India relations.

On Azhar's ban issue, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters yesterday that China is in "close contact with India".

India has publicly highlighted its disappointment to China over the issue.

India's reservations were conveyed by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and National Security Advisor Ajit Doval during their recent interactions with their Chinese counterparts.

The issue was expected to figure in Mukherjee's talks with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping scheduled on May 26.

The UN had banned JeM in 2001 but India's efforts to ban Azhar after the Mumbai terror attack also did not fructify as China, one of the five permanent members of the UNSC, did not allow the ban apparently at the behest of Pakistan.

The US State Treasury department had designated him as Special Designated Global Terrorist in 

The series production of the Tejas aircraft has already commenced at HAL Bangalore and the IAF intends to form the first squadron of the LCA on 01 July 2016. The IAF has also decided to place an order for an additional 80 Tejas in the advanced LCA MK1A configuration.

The specifications derived for design & development of LCA MK1A are based on the applicable international military standards. Kaizan techniques are being adopted to ensure international standards. The indigenous Light Combat Aircraft ‘Tejas’ has achieved initial operational clearance.

The HAL Tejas is a single-seat, single-jet engine, multi-role light fighter developed by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) designed for high manoeuvrability. It came from the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) program, which began in 1993 to replace India's ageing Soviet era MiG-21 fighters. LCA was officially named "Tejas" in 2003, meaning "Radiant" in Sanskrit by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

The South Block has packaged the ritual foray by naval ships in the Indo-Pacific into a flag-waving exercise in South China Sea. Indian warships are similarly engaged in the Gulf. Will this hype be carried over to Modi's US visit?

Indian naval helicopers rehearsing for the International Fleet review in Visakhapatnam in February this year. President Pranab Mukherjee reviewed a fleet of 70 naval ships, including several from foreign countries. PTI

Prime Minister Narendra Modi makes his fourth visit to the US this June. His joint address to the US Senate and the Congress is being touted as a major milestone in India-US ties. But several developments in the region should dampen his enthusiasm to go ahead with the burgeoning maritime partnership with the US, intended to corral China's growing influence in the South China Sea and the Western Pacific. 

The keenness among the quartet forged by the US to accomplish this purpose has started waning. It all began with the dethroning of Tony Abott as Australian Prime Minister, who like Modi and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, were willing partners for the move to divide responsibility in the oceans girding China as well as washing up their shores. 

Abott's replacement, Malcolm Turnbull has sent the first signal that while Australia will leave no stone unturned to guard its periphery, it would not like it to be misinterpreted in China. Much against popular anticipation among local think tanks, Turnbull decided to upend Japanese plans to mark their first foray into defence exports. The mouthwatering contract for a dozen submarines instead went to France with no stakes in the region after it was drummed out decades back from what was called Indo-China. The US-Japanese ploy to involve Australia into a deeper military embrace, of the kind being attempted with India, remains stillborn. 

India is one of the early adopters of this technology and has an edge over many other nations in effectively using this for operation planning, at a senior decision making level and for enhanced situational awareness, at a tactical level.

Inspired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Make in India’ initiative, technology startup, VizExperts, has created a Digital Sand Model(DSM) – a solution for operation planning, mission briefing and training, for the Indian paramilitary, police and the armed forces. When compared to the traditional static model, the digital sand model offers improved situational awareness to the armed forces through integrated, true 3D visualization of terrain data and online data from field formations.

Explains Praveen Bhaniramka- Founder and CEO of VizExperts, “Informed decision making in the real world requires Praveen Bhaniramka- Founder and CEO of VizExperts agglomeration of as much contextual information, as possible, in real time. However, the historic development of domain specific applications, systems and formats, had rendered discrete data sources that are incompatible with each other. But, today, with the push to reduce uncertainty in critical decision making, there is a convergence of several technologies and this is breaking down a lot of information silos. The Digital Sand Model (DSM) is one such convergence platform borne out of the integration of 3D GIS, simulation and gaming technologies.”

This integrated solution is widely used by the Indian army, paramilitary, police organizations and special forces for operation planning, mission briefing and training. The digital model offers true 3D visualization of all terrains including urban, rural, mountainous and desert areas for operation planning. Integration of organization specific workflows for training and input data integration for geo-tagged incident management is also made possible. An option of 3D scenario creation for mission briefing with immersive fly-through and walkthrough of operational area and animated 3D models depicting events and unit movement is also possible.

NEW DELHI — Only two weeks ago India's purchase of 36 Dassault Rafael fighters was considered imminent, but the deal has since been all but frozen and the country's general director of defense acquisition suddenly forced to step aside. Procurement officials in the Ministry of Defence (MoD) now are taking "a very cautious approach" in the $8.9 billion deal to buy 36 Rafale fighter jets, said an MoD source.

Early last month, for reasons that are not clear, former director general defense acquisition Smita Nagaraj was involuntarily placed on leave over differences with MoD leaders over Rafale negotiations, said the source.

Procurement officials in MoD are now too scared to clear any files and virtually all new acquisitions are stuck, the MoD source added.

Early this month, MoD officials conducted negotiations on the Rafale deal with French defense officials and it was decided that India for immediate requirements would make an unspecified number of weaponry purchases, including Mica air-to-air missiles, Scalp air-to-ground missiles, the Meteor beyond visual range missile and precision guided munitions at a cost of $1 billion. The negotiations also included a maintenance and engineering support agreement for five years at a cost of $500 million.

Dassault chairman Eric Trappier said in an April 13 radio report that he expected a contract could be signed “in the next few days," adding, “I have high hopes this contract could be signed fairly quickly.”

Always send your writer a thank-you note after you know the letter has been sent out, whether or not you have heard from the school. Don't wait too long to do this: a week or two is a good timeline.

Letters of recommendation are important parts of the admissions process, and should be treated as such. For some students, these letters will be a crucial element in acceptance, and for other students they can be perfect supplements for a college interview (sometimes called an admission interview).