Though 'acting' Finance Minister Piyush Goyal was waxing eloquent about the defence budget crossing Rs 3 lakh crore, a closer look at the budget reveals that the increase is only marginal and much less when compared to several earlier years.
The outlay for defence in the interim budget is Rs 3,05,296 crore, against last year's revised estimate of Rs 2,85,423 crore. This is a modest hike of 6.96 per cent, which hardly takes into consideration the inflation. In most years earlier, the year-on-year hike had been seven to 10 per cent.
Moreover, defence expenditure is only 11.4 per cent of the total government spend this time. In several earlier years it had been up to 14 per cent.
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A third of the total defence spend is going for pay and allowances. The Army will spend Rs 86559.71 crore, Navy Rs 6660 crore, and the IAF Rs 14962.04 on pay and allowances alone. This itself works out to more than Rs 1 lakh crore, which is about one-third of the total military spend.
The capital budget of the military, which is used for buying heavy-duty weaponry, is more or less the same amount—Rs 103380.34 crore.
In short, a third of the defence budget goes for pay and allowances, another third goes for capital purchases, and the remaining one-third for other things such as ammunition, fuel, transport, upkeep of fixed assets and training among others.
Within the total capital budget of Rs 1,03,380.34 crore, the IAF gets Rs 39,302.64 crore, the Army Rs 29,447.28 crore, and the Navy Rs 20,890.87 crore.
There are no major hikes in expenditure on specific major weaponry. Modernisation of the tank regiments appears to be in the offing. The budget for tanks and armoured vehicles has been increased from last year's revised estimate of 1,732.33 crore to Rs 2,128.05 crore. There is also indication of modernising the artillery regiments which have remained neglected since the Bofors scandal of the 1980s. The budget for major heavy equipment, which include artillery guns, has been hiked from Rs 16,993.38 to Rs 18,562.15 crore.
The Navy will spend Rs 12,182 crore for procuring warships and submarines. This is a modest increase from last year's revised estimate of Rs 11,313 crore. The Navy will also spend Rs 2,400 crore (against last year's revised estimate of Rs 1,900 crore) on helicopter and fixed wing aircraft.
The IAF's aircraft and aero-engine purchase budget is modestly cut from Rs 24,811.61 crore to RS 24,807.19 crore.
