ARMY, NAVY FLAG CONCERNS ABOUT BUDGET

NEWDELHI: The army and navy are unhappy with the budget allocated for new weapons and systems and have flagged their concerns before the parliamentary standing committee on defence.

The two services have told the panel that their capital expenditure for 2017-18 is less than last year’s budget estimates and fell far short of their expectations and requirements.

HT has learnt that army and navy representatives attended a meeting of the Parliamentary panel last week, where they presented figures to buttress their point, highlighting how the capital outlay was inadequate to power modernisation plans.

On February 1, India announced a defence budget of ₹2.74 lakh crore, a marginal increase over last year’s budget of ₹2.58 lakh crore. The spending includes a capital expenditure of ₹86,488 crore for modernisation.

The concerns of the army and navy are not unfounded.

Take the case of the army. The government has set aside ₹ 25,175 crore as capital expenditure for the force, lower than the budget estimate of ₹26,791 crore last year. Similarly, the navy’s share works out to ₹19,348 crore compared to last year’s budget estimate of ₹22,000 crore.