Achieving the intended outcomes of the 13th five-year defence plan is critically dependent on the ability of the Ministry of Finance to increase the defence budget by at least 100 per cent from next year onward.

Indian industry, which is the intended beneficiary of this preference policy, needs to play a proactive role in facilitating the smooth implementation of the order.

Speaking at the United Service Institution on May 4, 2017, the Chief of the Army Staff said that India needs to spend much more on military modernisation to ensure that economic growth continues unhindered.

It is important to restore the functional self-sufficiency of the finance division of a ministry which handles 17-18 per cent of the total central government expenditure so that it could discharge its responsibilities without real or perceived pressures.

The basic challenge for defence economists is to demonstrate that there are other feasible ways of skinning the cat during budget formulation. But the challenge is also inextricably linked with the need for rationalisation of defence expenditure.

There is a strong case for abandoning the present approach of looking at the defence budget through the narrow prism of allocation and utilisation, and instead focus on outcomes.