Categories: Defence

India’s Defence Exports at Rs 8000 Cr in H1 Of FY23

India registered defence exports worth Rs 8,000 crore in six months of the current financial year and aims to achieve the annual export target of Rs 35,000 crore by 2025, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said. He was speaking at the curtain raiser event of DefExpo, scheduled to be held from October 18 to 22, in Gandhinagar.

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What The Rajnath Singh Said:

Singh said India’s defence sector registered exports worth Rs 30,000 crore after 2014 when the Narendra Modi government came to power at the Centre. He said India is progressing speedily on the path to achieving global standards of design, development and manufacturing at the international level.

“Before 2014, we used to achieve (defence) exports of Rs 900-1,300 crore. After all these years, we have achieved exports worth more than Rs 30,000 crore to date. We can add another Rs 8,000-9,000 crore of the export target (this year),” Singh said. “We target to achieve (annual defence) exports worth Rs 35,000 crore by the end of FY 2025. We have achieved exports worth Rs 8,000 crore in six months (of FY 2022-23),” Singh said.

Defence Exhibition:

Gandhinagar is set to host India’s biggest-ever defence exhibition to date – DefExpo 2022 –beginning. This 12th edition of the event has been organised on the theme ‘Path to Pride’. Singh said India in the last few years covered a transformational journey from a (defence) importer to an exporter. DefExpo will add pace to this journey, he added. “India which was until a few years back considered the world’s biggest (defence) importer is now standing in the queue of 25 top exporting countries,” the defence minister said in his address. He said more than 13,000 companies are participating in the DefExpo. “India had achieved exports of defence items and technology worth a record Rs 13,000 crore in 2021-22, which is likely to rise to Rs 17,000 crore in 2022-23,” Defence Secretary Ajay Kumar said. Officials said so far 451 agreements related to the defence sector with proposed investment of Rs 1.50 lakh crore have been signed in run up to the DefExpo. Of these, Gujarat-based companies have signed MoUs with an investment pledge of Rs 5,000 crore, they said.

New Avenues For Exports:

“We are helping African countries by building their capacity using our defence industry. We are trying to find solutions to drug trafficking, piracy and other such issues in partnership. Overall, our cooperation in the Indian Ocean is being carried out with the Prime Minister’s vision of Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR),” he said.

The senior bureaucrat said “Invest for Defence’ is being organised for the first time at the DefExpo. “The aim is for our investors, financial institutions, venture capitals and private equity funds to know about investment opportunities in defence,” he said.

Kumar said the ‘Bandhan’ event at the expo is about signing business agreements. In the last DefExpo held in Lucknow, 201 agreements were signed. This time, so far 451 agreements have been inked committing Rs 1.50 lakh crore investment, he added.