In a groundbreaking revelation for India’s defense exports, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh declared on Monday that it has surged to unprecedented levels, surpassing the remarkable milestone of Rs 21,000 crore. Illuminating this achievement, the Defense Minister disclosed that India’s defense exports have soared to a staggering Rs 21,083 crore in the fiscal year 2023-24, marking a substantial 32.5 percent increase over the preceding fiscal year’s figure of Rs 15,920 crore. The recent statistics underscore a remarkable growth of 31 times over the past decade, compared to FY 2013-14.
Commending the visionary leadership of PM Modi, under whose stewardship the Defense Ministry has embarked on numerous initiatives to galvanize India’s defense manufacturing and exports, Rajnath Singh remarked, “Our defense industries, encompassing both the private sector and DPSUs, have exhibited commendable performance in recent years. Heartfelt congratulations to all stakeholders for achieving this significant milestone in defense exports.”
Analyzing the data over two decades, spanning from 2004-05 to 2013-14 and 2014-15 to 2023-24, it emerges that defense exports have surged by 21 times. The total defense exports from 2004-05 to 2013-14 amounted to Rs 4,312 crore, which has escalated to an impressive Rs 88,319 crore in the period from 2014-15 to 2023-24,” as per the Ministry of Defense.
It is worth noting that despite the significant strides made by the Modi government in recent years towards achieving self-reliance in military equipment under the Atmanirbhar Bharat initiative, a recent report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), released last month, revealed that India remains the world’s foremost arms importer.
According to the Swedish think tank SIPRI, India’s “arms imports increased by 4.7 percent between 2014–18 and 2019–23. While Russia continued to be India’s primary arms supplier (constituting 36 percent of its arms imports), this marks the first five-year period since 1960–64 where deliveries from Russia (or the Soviet Union before 1991) accounted for less than half of India’s arms imports.”
