New Delhi. 19 November 2018. Speculation and expectations of nearly two decade have come to an end today when the Russian Igla-S System is announced the lowest bidder putting an end to hopes of Swedish Saab and European consortium MBDA to strengthen their already strong relationship with India.
Indian Army’s need of Very Short-Range Air Defence Systems (VSHORADS) now seems to be coming nearer to reality. L1 being the criterion results into Russian getting the piece of the pie but the other two contestants RBS 70 NG and Mistral are definitely as good systems and would have made India Army as richer. So definitely the competition was tough and world class.
But the Russian win is despite rumoured problems during the field evaluations of Igla-S which saw a failure in firing, target acquisition and sighting during trials. So either the problems were sorted out or long term relations shared by India and Russia got precedence once the trials completed and opening of the commercial bid became all the more reason to choose it. In the prevailing situation Russia will definitely sort out the issues before the signatures are done and order placed.
So Russia will bag this $1.5-billion contract from India which is beneath the Damocles sword of financial sanctions by the US for weapons purchased from Moscow. The sirprise of the commercial bid is that the Russian quote is even less than India’s anticipated benchmark price of $2 Billion.
It may be recalled that the VSHORAD procurement started on a problematic note in 1999, when the decision to buy was taken and official files moved and the global tenders were floated only in 2010. The Koreans could not make it post the initial stage and the it took 8 years for Government of India to eventually decide on which of the three in contest they wanted. And this was when the need was dire and emergent. There are many a slip between the cup and the lip as is evident from the latest procurement history of Indian defence and lets keep our fingers crossed for the Indian Army.
