Editorial: Has (Yet) Another Indo-Russian Weapons Deal Gone Awry?

Kamov Ka-226T (Image: Wiki Commons)

By Franz-Stefan Gady

India and Russia are both struggling to meet the “Make in India” requirements in a new defense deal.

While Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin have signed a government-to-government deal for the procurement of 200 Kamov-226T last December, New Delhi and Moscow have difficulties in meeting the so-called “Make in India” obligation, which requires that 50 percent of the helicopter needs to be built in India, according to Indian media reports.

One of the major problems appears to be that Moscow has only accepted to indigenize Russian components of the light multirole helicopter, assembled by Russia’s sole rotorcraft designer Russian Helicopters. However, for example, the helicopters twin Arrius 2G1 engines –which, according to The Business Standard, constitute one third of the aircraft’s costs–are made by French helicopter maker Turbomeca. Various other component parts of the Kamov-226T have also been imported by Russian Helicopters from abroad, all of which would not fall under indigenization requirements outlined in the contract.

The burden has now fallen on India’s state-owned Hindustan Aeronautics Limited and other Indian manufacturers to negotiate with third-party vendors to build individual hardware for the Kamov-226T in India. “We will have to work with third-country suppliers and co-co-opt them into the indigenization effort to meet the ‘Make in India’ goals,” according to sources within HAL HAL and Russian Helicopters agreed in late December 2015 to form a joint venture, in which the former will have a 50.5 percent stake and the latter a 49.5 percent share.

Read the full story at The Diplomat