Green energy target tough to achieve, say officials
Rooftop solar programme making poor progress as it is not cost-effective
•The government is unlikely to meet its much publicised target of 175 GW (gigawatt = 1,000 megawatt) of renewable energy by 2022 due to the poor progress of the rooftop solar programme, according to officials in the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy. The Ministry was considering increasing the contribution of other sources such as biogas and small hydro to make up the difference, they said.
Several issues
•“You see, there are several issues with rooftop solar,” an official told The Hindu on the condition of anonymity.
•“The policy issue is that the tariff structure right now is such that it is just not remunerative for people to set up rooftop solar. The cost of doing so higher than the money they stand to make. The other issue is the use that people put their roofs to. Most roofs in India are flat, and people find several alternative uses for these such as drying clothes, and even hosting parties or meals. There are parts of India where people even sleep on their roofs. So they don’t want to cover that whole space with solar panels,” the official said.
New plan
•The government was aware of these issues and was considering a new plan to incentivise rooftop solar, he said. “There are talks in the Ministry about what to do about this. But at the moment, it looks unlikely that the government will meet the 175 GW target because of this segment, solar rooftops. Every other segment is moving on track.”
•The government had a announced a target of 40 GW of rooftop solar by 2022, but had achieved only about 1.3 GW as of December 2016, which is a little more than 3% of the target.
•“On current trends, it does look like the rooftop solar target will be missed,” Arunabha Ghosh, CEO of the Council on Energy, Environment & Water told The Hindu. “The challenges for rooftop solar are different. The first is that we don’t have financial institutions aggregating demand across a fundamentally disparate set of projects. Unless this is done, it will be difficult to attract the kind of investment needed.”
•The second issue, Mr Ghosh said, was the de-risking of investment in the rooftop space. While this has been done for commercial solar projects, it has not been done for rooftop solar. The third problem is that there is no regulatory clarity on guaranteed payment by utilities on the net metering basis.
•“If these are addressed, then the investment in this area can significantly pick up,” Mr Ghosh said.
•“Implementation of rooftop solar is taking place at a much slower pace and it seems unlikely that the government would achieve its 40GW target by 2022,” a recent report by the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Care Ratings said. “Specific policy initiatives to support rooftop solar especially effective net-metering implementation and offering incentives in order to attract financial investors needs to be introduced.”
•Another official said, “The Ministry is considering increasing the contributions of biogas and small hyrdro to make up the difference. These are doing very well and there is capacity to increase their contribution.”
•The government’s current plan is to get 10 GW from biomass powered plants and 5 GW from small hydro (hydro projects below 25 MW in scale). According to a May 2016 report by the Standing Committee set up by the Ministry, the country has a potential of 19.7 GW of energy capacity from small hydro. It has so far utilised only about 21% of this.
•Energy experts, however, have been saying that this potential is largely notional since the locations of these projects are in increasingly difficult terrain, increasing the cost of the projects, and hence the tariffs at which they will be able to deliver energy.
Animal sightings rise as water dries up
Water scarcity in Odisha forests critical, authorites hope for early monsoon
•Forest officials across Odisha are keeping their fingers crossed for the early arrival of monsoon as water scarcity in jungles has reached a critical stage, forcing wild animals to stray into human habitations more frequently. Such incidents of animals straying past the jungles have seen a rise over the past fortnight.
•On Sunday, two persons were injured when a wild boar attacked them near their village in Balangir district while a herd of seven elephants wreaked havoc in Gajapati district.
Elephants’ off-season raid
•It is apprehended that a further stretch in the current dry spell could aggravate the situation. Sample this; a gaur (Indian bison) was found dead near a water source which had completely dried up in Satkosia Gorge Sanctuary in Angul district recently. Forest officials had noticed that the gaur had made a desperate attempt to access water by digging the soil with its horns before its death.
•In Rajnagar area of Kendrapara district, a spotted deer strayed into human habitation in search of water as there is acute shortage in Bhitarkanika National park.
•Incident of elephants coming close to human habitations in the State have become extremely common. Earlier, the elephants were known to raid crops between November and February.
•In summer, the jumbos are expected to stay deep inside the cooler forest environment.
•However, they have been regularly found wandering near villages this time around. Experts said that it is the acute water scarcity in forests that is driving the animals out of their habitats.
Water tankers
•While authorities have pinned hopes on early showers for a much-needed relief to animals in forests, Satkosia Wildlife Division, for the first time in Odisha, has started dispatching water tankers to forests at regular intervals to quench the thirst of wild animals.
•As the situation went out of control, we were forced to set up pits using cemented rings at 80 places. It worked wonderfully well, quenching the thirst of wild animals at this critical juncture, he said.
•Water shortage is one of the reasons behind dwindling elephant population in Satkosia. “In 2012, we had 229 elephants in Satkosia forest, it dropped to 146 in 2015 and there might be a further drop this year. Residential elephants migrate to other places in search of water,” Mr. Rahmen said.
Maharashtra releases Koyna water to crisis-hit Karnataka
Officials say 0.5 TMC water to be discharged over a 10-day period
•Pune: The Maharashtra government on Sunday released water from the Koyna dam in Satara district to alleviate the water crisis in Karnataka. Around 0.5 TMC water will be released over a 10-day period, authorities have said.
•Water level in the Kaveri river basin has plummeted due to the soaring temperature.
•This is the second such discharge from the Koyna reservoir to Karnataka. Last month, 2.5 TMC water was released from the reservoir following a high-level meeting between officials of the neighbouring States.
•This cumulative discharge of 3 TMC follows a direct appeal on part of Karnataka Water Resources Minister M. B. Patil to provide relief to Belagavi, Bagalkot and Vijaypura districts. In return, Karnataka will release water from the Almatti dam to cater to the needs of Solapur district and others parts in Maharashtra facing water shortage.
•Late last month, Maharashtra Water Resources Minister Girish Mahajan had said nine of the 12 dams in Karnataka barely had 20% of their water stock. “The available live storage in the reservoirs has touched an all-time low,” Mr. Mahajan had said, adding that he had ordered the discharge from Koyna dam to bring immediate relief to farmers in Karnataka.
•With a storage capacity of 105 TMC, the Koyna reservoir is one of the largest dams in the State. It houses the massive Koyna hydropower generation plant.
•Three consecutive years of drought have aggravated the agrarian crisis in Karnataka, especially in the north.
Addressing the court within
India must use this initial victory at The Hague to appeal to our own finest sense of conscience
•By itself, the International Court of Justice’s order, delivered on May 18, imposing provisional measures injuncting Pakistan from executing an Indian national, Kulbhushan Jadhav, is entirely unexceptional. The ICJ has merely arrived at a prima facie satisfaction — based on an analysis at first sight — that it possesses the power to rule on India’s application, and that India’s rights, under the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, have plausibly been violated by Pakistan’s detention, trial and ultimate sentencing to death of Jadhav. There is now a worry, not without cause, that Pakistan may not comply with the ICJ’s direction, despite its explicitly binding status. What’s more, the internationalisation of the dispute potentially comes with its political ramifications for India. But much as all these considerations can serve as a basis for cynicism, we mustn’t despair at India’s choice. Its victory, impermanent as it may ultimately prove to be, must be celebrated for what it is: a vindication of the rule of law.
Dispelling old concerns
•Too often ontological concerns encumber the study of international law — questions tend to revolve around whether international law is really law at all, and, if so, whether its principles even matter. Despite consistent empirical evidence which shows that international law positively influences state behaviour, these questions, seeped in scepticism, somehow never seem to go away. India’s choice of the ICJ as a legitimate site for dispute resolution, even if it was borne out of self-interest, can help dispel some of these age-old concerns. But for that to happen, India must take on the additional responsibility that comes with its choice, to show us that it possesses the moral authority to charge other nations with a breach of the law. To achieve this, we must drive the Indian government towards greater domestic compliance with its own obligations under both treaty and customary law alike, to demonstrate that our own sense of conscience is stirred by the mandates of the world order.
•First, though, let’s consider the facts of the present dispute, as they are. Although India and Pakistan disagree over the precise nature of who Mr. Jadhav is and where he was arrested, the crux of India’s case, which Pakistan hasn’t particularly disputed on facts, is this: that Mr. Jadhav was denied consular access, despite numerous requests from India. Pakistan claims that these actions do not breach the Vienna Convention, as Jadhav was involved in espionage and sabotage. India submits that the treaty creates no such exception and that the denial of consular access is an infringement for which Pakistan must make reparations. To this end, India has sought, among other things, an order that would declare the sentence of the Pakistani military court as violating Article 36 of the Vienna Convention, which both countries as parties are bound by.
•This provision defines the rights granted to consular officials, with a view to helping them exercise their consular functions. Specifically, it accords a privilege to officials to not only freely communicate with any national of its state detained in the other country, but also the right of visiting the detained individual, and arranging for legal representation, if the détenu so desires. It is India’s case that these privileges were denied to it. Pakistan alleges that the Convention’s privileges were not only inapplicable, but that the ICJ, in any event, lacks the jurisdiction to decide the dispute. Or, in other words, the court, it says, does not possess the power to make a legal determination on the dispute.
•Ordinarily, rows between nations can be taken to the World Court only if both parties consent to the court’s jurisdiction. In this case, however, India relies on Article 36(1) of the Statute of the ICJ which accords to the court the power to decide disputes arising out of treaties or conventions that specifically vest the court with compulsory jurisdiction. The Vienna Convention, through an optional protocol that both India and Pakistan are signatories to, is one such agreement.
ICJ in the picture
•As India has pointed out in its application, the ICJ has, at least in two notable instances, entertained applications under Article 36(1) of its statute for breaches of the Vienna Convention. In 2001, the court ruled that the United States had violated its obligations to Germany in denying consular access to the LaGrand brothers, citizens of Germany who had been convicted and sentenced to death in the state of Arizona. Similarly, in the Avena case in 2004, the court ruled that the U.S. had failed to comply with the Vienna Convention in several instances involving Mexican nationals. The court here directed the U.S. to review and reconsider its convictions and sentences, in a manner that would take into account the breaches made of the treaty.
•Pakistan, for its part, has resisted references to LaGrand and Avena . It claims that the two countries are governed by a 2008 bilateral agreement on consular access, which effectively exempts Pakistan from its obligations under the Vienna Convention, and which also ousts altogether the ICJ’s jurisdiction. More ominously, however, it argues that the Vienna Convention does not apply when a person has been detained for offences involving espionage or terrorism, as concerns over national security always trump the demands of consular relations.
•The ICJ is yet to rule conclusively on any of these arguments. It has only granted India provisional measures pending a final adjudication. But, on any reasonable final consideration, Pakistan’s arguments ought not to pass muster. The 2008 bilateral understanding between the countries no doubt imposes particular responsibilities on them, but by no means does it relieve either country from its obligations under the Vienna Convention. As the opinions in LaGrand andAvena make clear, once a foreign national is arrested the state making the arrest has a duty to allow the consular officials of the sending state to visit the détenuand to render to him all the assistance that he needs. It’s easy to see that Pakistan is in breach of this fundamental obligation. Its endeavour to wriggle out of this responsibility citing concerns over national security is also likely to fail. Were such an argument to be accepted, it would potentially lead to a most dangerous situation, where countries can ignore their consular obligations purely because they consider the sending state an enemy.
•Whichever way the ICJ’s decision might eventually go, the critical question, for now, though remains this: will Pakistan obey the court’s provisional measures? Should it choose to ignore the order, it can glean much from the American experience. The U.S., after all, went ahead in executing one of the LaGrandbrothers despite an explicit injunction from the ICJ, prohibiting it from carrying out the death sentence, pending a final adjudication. Ultimately, in 2005, the U.S. withdrew altogether from the Optional Protocol, which grants the ICJ compulsory jurisdiction over claims made under the Vienna Convention.
A glass already half full
•When we see naked expressions of power such as this, it’s easy to conclude that international law exists in vacuity, that its principles aren’t merely flawed but that they are also law only in their name. However, we can still see the present proceedings as a tunnel that ends with the optimistic light of day. Even if Pakistan were to disregard the ICJ’s order, the case shows us that there do exist concrete sources — a treaty in this case — which impose an ethical duty on nation-states to follow the rule of law. It allows us to consider what the scholar Thomas M. Franck described as “post-ontological” questions, to address not whether international law really is law, but the more normative concerns over how best to enforce its commands. We must therefore use this opportunity to shun scepticism, and appeal to our finest sense of conscience. We can only do this by resisting a push for greater governmental freedom at the domestic level, which invariably tends to carry itself into the sphere of international relations, where our own obligations — think climate change, customary refugee law, fundamental human rights, among others — often stand breached. To set the right moral example we must start from within.
Cool down the rhetoric
The U.S. will gain little by turning India into an adversary on climate change issues
•U.S. President Donald Trump’s accusation against India concerning the Paris Accord that “...the U.S. pays billions of dollars while China, Russia, and India have contributed (to pollution) and will contribute nothing” is inaccurate, misleading and unfair. In fact, India has walked with the U.S. from Stockholm to Paris via Rio de Janeiro, Kyoto and Copenhagen. New Delhi has fought for climate justice, equity and fairness all the way, demanding that developing countries should be entitled to maintain and increase their greenhouse gas emissions for survival and developed countries should mandatorily cut their luxury emissions. At the same time, India has also been sensitive to the constraints of the U.S. and the other industrialised nations in reducing emissions.
•Indira Gandhi had exposed the Western efforts to impose environmental colonialism at the Stockholm Conference in 1972 and declared that “poverty is the worst polluter” and demanded that “the polluter must pay”. But she had also conceded that development should be sustainable. India’s Chandrashekhar Dasgupta and U.S.’s Al Gore worked together for the historic agreements in Rio de Janeiro, which led to the signing of the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) in 1992.
Grand Rio bargain
•The concept of “common, but differentiated responsibilities” led to the identification of Annex I countries, which agreed to mandatory cuts. The idea that developed countries should meet the “incremental costs” of developing countries using environment-friendly technologies was another element in the grand bargain at Rio. Huge commitments were made not only for financial support, but also for technology transfer at concessional prices. The fine balance struck by India and the U.S. culminated in the Agenda 21, raising hopes for a renaissance in the areas of both environment and development.
•When the U.S. and other developed countries — particularly Japan, Canada, Australia and New Zealand — began to renege on their commitments and began demanding mandatory cuts from China, India and Brazil during the Berlin negotiations (1995), India did not dismiss their demands out of hand. It accommodated various mechanisms to reduce the burden of the developed world. For this reason, the Kyoto Protocol had a reasonable chance of success, but it was the U.S. that refused to sign it and started to wriggle out of every understanding reached. The whole approach was sought to be changed till the adoption of the Copenhagen Consensus, which was disowned by most of the developing countries. In Copenhagen, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh personally participated in the new understanding that all commitments would be voluntary and that the UN would only supervise and evaluate their implementation. This incurred the wrath of many developing countries. What remained was only a myth that the Kyoto Protocol was still alive and well and that the Rio spirit was intact.
•The much acclaimed Paris Accord was a requiem for Rio and all that the FCCC stood for. The whole value of the accord has been challenged by those who had worked tirelessly for an international consensus to save the planet. James Hansen, formerly the chief climatologist of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), was forthright in his assessment: “It is a fraud really, a fake,” he said. “It is just b******* for them to say, ‘we will have a 2° Celsius warming target and try to do a little better every five years’. It is just worthless words. There is no action, just promises. As long as fossil fuels appear to be the cheapest fuel out there, they will continue to be burned.”
•By its very nature, the Paris Accord does not warrant the argument made by Mr. Trump. It contains no financial commitment from the U.S. or any other country except a vague offer of $100 billion after 2020. The Accord deals with the global commitments of countries regarding emissions, mitigation, adaptation and financing from 2020. The allegation that China, Russia and India are only contributing to pollution and not to climate change fund has no basis whatsoever.
•The essence of the Paris Accord is only a “strong agreement” to hold the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2° Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5° Celsius above pre-industrial levels. But the “Nationally Determined Contributions” submitted so far make it clear that they will not be able to hold the increase to below 3° Celsius.
•The advantage that the U.S. and other developed countries have gained from the Paris Accord is that all economies, including China and India, are being made to take action on climate change without any commensurate guarantees from the former on funding and transfer of technology. The financial commitment that the U.S. has undertaken is only to change to new energy sources. Naturally, the cost of the switch will be more for the U.S. than for China or India and this cannot be considered as a payout. As eleven State Governors have written to President Trump, if the U.S. abandons its investments in climate change, India and China will benefit from the low-carbon leadership they acquire over time. By maintaining the momentum in global efforts, the U.S. will benefit through its own transition to clean energy. India had initially hesitated to ratify the Paris Accord out of fear that it might not be able to invest in clean energy like nuclear power, unless it gains entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Apparently, it ratified the accord on the basis of certain assurances in this regard from former U.S. President Barack Obama.
•India was seen as an adversary at the beginning of the Paris Conference, because of its championship of the Kyoto Protocol. It was only after it virtually abandoned Kyoto by saying that the world had to go beyond the failed agreements of the past that its status changed from that of a “challenge” to a “partner” in the eyes of the U.S. The New York Times’s cartoon showing India as the elephant stopping the Paris train in its tracks was not an exaggeration of the Indian position at the time of the beginning of the Paris conference.
•India may have eventually embraced the lesser evil of voluntary cuts for everyone rather than mandatory cuts for the main emitters, among which New Delhi itself might have been counted. The U.S. will gain little by turning India into an adversary once again at a time when a whole range of issues in India-U.S. relations are yet to be clarified and taken forward. Walking together on climate change will be beneficial to both.
•The writer was the vice-chairman of the Conference of Parties of the Framework Convention on Climate Change from 1992 to 1995 and Chairman of the G-77 at the Berlin Conference in 1995
An opportunity being drained away
Sound policies on wastewater treatment and use are vital to sustainable development
•Each year a specific aspect of water is highlighted while observing International World Water Day (March 22); this year’s theme was “wastewater”, which is defined as any water that has been adversely affected in quality by anthropogenic influences and as a result of domestic, industrial, commercial and agricultural activities.
•In recent decades, population growth, accelerated urbanisation and economic development have resulted in an increase in the quantity of wastewater and the overall pollution load being generated. Most of our freshwater sources are under threat. When public awareness of pollution is limited, the cost of pollution to our health and the ecosystem is huge. The victims are generally the poor or socially vulnerable communities, and the end result is a high financial burden on the community and government.
Water facts
•Globally, over 80% of the wastewater generated goes back to the ecosystem without being treated or reused. Another fact is that 1.8 billion people use drinking water contaminated with faeces which increases their risk of contracting cholera, dysentery, typhoid and polio. Also, 663 million people still lack access to improved drinking water sources.
•The opportunities for exploiting wastewater as a resource are enormous. Safely managed wastewater is an affordable and sustainable source of water, energy, nutrients and other recoverable materials. The benefits to our health, and in terms of economic development and environmental sustainability, business opportunities and ‘green’ jobs far outweigh the costs of wastewater management.
•By 2030, the global demand for water is expected to grow by 50%. Most of this demand will be in cities. In low-income areas of cities/towns within developing countries, a large proportion of wastewater is discharged directly into the surface water drain, without or with limited treatment. Traditional wastewater treatment plants may not remove certain pollutants. In India, about 29,000 million l/day (mld) of waste water is generated from class-I cities and class-II towns, out of which about 45% (about 13,000 mld) is generated from metro cities alone. A collection system exists for only about 30% of the wastewater through sewer lines, while treatment capacity exists for about 7,000 mld.
•Industrial water consumption accounts for 22% of the global water used. The industrial sector in India discharges around 30,730 million cubic metres of effluents, without proper treatment, into waterbodies. Unfortunately, most common effluent treatment plants are not performing satisfactorily due to improper operations and maintenance.
Run-off from agriculture fields is another major source of pollution.
•India, with 17% of the world’s population, 4% of water resources and 2.4% of land area, extracts water significantly for various developmental purposes. Hence, the water flow or storage capacity of water bodies has declined substantially, adversely affecting their waste assimilation/sink functions.
•Past experience shows that significant progress has not been achieved despite legislative and policy measures being introduced with huge budgets to solve water pollution issues. Water pollution is not a major topic of political debate as yet.
Management strategies
•There is sufficient evidence to suggest that the problem, though complex, is solvable. While it is not realistic to aim for zero water pollution, a level of socially acceptable pollution, respecting the integrity of ecosystems and service provision, can be reached.
•At the national and regional levels, water pollution prevention policies should be integrated into non-water policies that have implications on water quality such as agriculture and land use management, trade, industry, energy, and urban development. Water pollution should be made a punishable offence. The effectiveness and power of the “polluter pay principle” should be considered.
•Various policies, plans and strategies to protect water resources should be participatory, allowing for consultation between government, industry and the public. At the local level, capacity building enables the community to make decisions and disseminate them to the appropriate authorities, thus influencing political processes. Market-based strategies such as environmental taxes, pollution levies and tradable permit systems should be implemented, and can be used to fight against or abate water pollution. Incentive mechanisms such as subsidies, soft loans, tax relaxation should be included in installing pollution management devices.
•In industrial pollution management, technological attempts should be made through cleaner production-technology. Sophisticated pollution management technology developed overseas should be introduced in India. The application of eco-friendly inputs such as biofertilizers and pesticides in agriculture and the use of natural dyes in textile industries can reduce the pollution load considerably.
•Since fresh water is increasingly getting scarce, wastewater generated in urban areas can be used for sub-urban agriculture, industry, and even sanitation and certain domestic applications after treatment. Wastewater need not be a burden any longer but an asset instead.
Coal comeuppance: on coal block allocation case
The coal block allocation case may become a benchmark for other ongoing prosecutions
•It is arguably the logical consequence of the 2014 Supreme Court order declaring all coal block allocations made since 1993 illegal and arbitrary.The conviction of three Coal Ministry officials, including former Secretary H.C. Gupta, marks the first case in which individual criminal liability has been fixed on public servants in the coal block scam. Two previous trials had ended in convictions, but those held guilty were officials of private companies who had deceived the authorities into allotting them blocks. Mr. Gupta was the chairperson of the screening committee that recommended allocations. It functioned for years without regard for guidelines, norms or transparency, until the apex court halted its irregular run. He and two other public servants have been found guilty of abusing their positions to procure a coal block for Kamal Sponge Steel and Power Limited. While it was fairly clear that the screening committee route was only a mechanism to push through the applications of all and sundry for coal blocks, especially under the first UPA government, it was not certain if it could be proved beyond reasonable doubt that public servants had manipulated the system to their advantage. Special CBI Court Judge Bharat Parashar has now ruled that Coal Ministry officials deliberately allowed an incomplete application from an ineligible company to be taken up for consideration. Far from ‘screening’ applications, he finds that the accused actually let all applications pass without any checking so that “they will have an open field to arbitrarily exercise their discretion in favour of any company”.
•The verdict is a studied indictment of government processes, or the lack of processes, during the period. Looking at the prosecution charges and the defence claims, it appears there was little clarity on whether the guidelines were being adhered to. The former Secretary and Joint Secretary said in their defence they could not verify applications for completeness and eligibility, as it was the job of the section concerned. The section says this is the job of the administrative ministry or the State government to which applications are forwarded. Other omissions include the failure to evolve any inter se criteria to decide eligibility, or to do any verification either before or after the screening committee recommended allocations to the Minister. Whether there was a conspiracy between the officials and the company and whether the prosecution proved that these omissions amounted to deliberate abuse of their positions will be matters that will, no doubt, be taken up on appeal; but the significance of the verdict is that it may become a benchmark for other ongoing prosecutions on similar lines. The case also raises questions about the role and responsibility of a Secretary to the government, who is not only the administrative head of a department but also an adviser to the Minister on matters of policy.
Defence deals await private firms
The contracts totalling Rs. 1.5 lakh crore will be taken up under the new strategic partnership model
•The Union government will unveil mega defence deals estimated at over Rs. 1.5 lakh crore involving the private sector under the strategic partnership model to build a domestic defence manufacturing base in key areas such as submarines and fighter aircraft.
•“It should possibly be cleared in the next few weeks, likely within the month,” a senior official told The Hindu on Sunday.
•The Defence Acquisition Council approved the framework of the model on Saturday. The policy will now go to the Finance Ministry and then to the Cabinet Committee on Security for final approval, which is expected to be a formality as the Prime Minister’s Office has already been briefed on the issue.
•The new model, which is a chapter under the Defence Procurement Procedure, has four segments —submarines, single-engine fighter aircraft, helicopters and armoured carriers/main battle tanks — and specifically intends to open up defence manufacturing to the private sector.
•“These big companies will be the lead integrators. The contract will be spread across the Indian industry at various levels. The current model plans to build an ancillary network which works far more efficiently,” the official said.
•This, he said, will indigenise the sub-systems and components and after a couple of cycles “everything should be built here”.
•Pointing out that the other aspect of the policy is the export potential, the official said, “We will then get into a supply chain with the global original equipment manufacturers.”
Projects lined up
•Projects already lined up under the four segments have been held up because of a delay in formulating the policy. The Ministry is gearing up to quickly roll them out once the policy is in place.
•Of the four deals, submarines and helicopters are for the Navy. The single-engine fighter is for the Indian Air Force and armoured vehicle for the Army.
•The deal for six submarines under Project-75I is expected to cost around Rs. 50,000 crore, the one for 100-plus fighter aircraft is estimated at Rs. 60,000 crore and the Future Infantry Combat Vehicle (FICV) programme is estimated at Rs. 50,000 crore.
•Expression of Interest (EoI) will be issued to Indian companies for each of the projects, officials said. A pool of capable companies will be selected based on technical and financial evaluation and they would then tie up with a foreign OEM which will be short-listed concurrently.
Indian bidders
•According to officials, for the submarines, the likely contenders are Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and Reliance Defence and Engineering Ltd., which have their own shipyards and the public sector Mazagon Docks Ltd., which is building the French Scorpene submarines.
•For the fighter and helicopter segments, the likely bidders are Tata Advanced Systems Ltd. and Mahindra, both of which have a footprint in the aviation sector.
•In the armoured segment, the FICV programme under way will be taken up under the SP model. L&T, Mahindra and Tata Motors are leading the race, for which bids have already been submitted.
Explain Gorshkov cost: CIC
Navy asked to disclose reasons for accepting price escalation by Russia
•The Central Information Commission has asked the Indian Navy to disclose the reasons for India agreeing to cost escalation by Russia for purchase of refurbished aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov .
•The deal for purchasing the now 30-year-old warship rechristened INS Vikramaditya was signed in 2004 by the then NDA government for $974 million which was increased to the final price of $2.35 billion in 2010.
•The commission has also directed the the Navy disclose the “net final cost” incurred on the modifications, renovation and remodelling done on the ship, besides dates of payments made by India.
•The Navy had earlier told the Commission that the information was to be provided by the Defence Ministry, which claimed the relevant files were with the naval headquarters and that they have been asked to disclose the details.
•Information Commissioner Amitava Bhattacharyya directed the Navy to disclose the file notings, correspondence, and documents related to the acceptance of cost revisions sought by the Russians.
•Mr. Bhattacharyya noted that the Navy was trying to put the onus of disclosure on the Defence Ministry whereas the Ministry made it clear that the reply was to be furnished by the force.
•The Commission has ordered the disclosure to be made as it found “larger public interest” was involved. The Ministry and the Navy had withheld the information on the grounds of national security.
•Mr. Bhattacharyya also directed the Navy to disclose reasons why India chose to opt for a refurbished warship instead of buying a new one.
•The RTI application was filed by activist Subhash Agrawal who had demanded a range of information on the acquisition of the 44,500-tonne aircraft carrier.
•The ship was originally commissioned by the erstwhile USSR on December 20, 1987 and was decommissioned in 1996. After being inducted into the Navy asVikramaditya , the ship is now a floating 284-metre airfield. It is a 20-storey steel megastructure from the keel to the highest point. The ship can carry over 30 aircraft. With 22 decks and a capacity to house 1,600 personnel, the warship can sustain itself at sea for 45 days up to 13,000 km.
