Improving India’s Defence Indigenisation Ranking: Interview with SIPRI expert

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SIPRI’s seminal annual report, “Trends In International Arms Transfers, 2025,” [The Report] was published on March 09.

As anticipated given the geopolitical flux and ongoing armed conflict, the Report has seen an increase in volume of arms transfers by 9.2 percent during the period 2021-25 from the previous five­ year period (2016–20) A review of the report is available here.

As per the Report, India remained the world’s second largest recipient of major arms in 2021–25 with an 8.2 per cent share of total global arms imports. Ukraine with the ongoing War with Russia topped the list which is not surprising.

The SIPRI Report recorded that in a mark of indigenisation Indian arms imports fell by 4.0 per cent between 2016–20 and 2021–25 which is attributed to India’s ability to design and produce indigenous weapons.

Indian Ministry of Defence has published data indicating in the past five years or so 60 to 70 percent of defence acquisitions have been indigenously produced split between the Indian Defence Public Sector Units [DPSUs] and private companies. The SIPRI Report of India’s ranking as the second largest arms importer has raised scepticism, needing deeper examining.

Moreover, despite an increase in defence exports, India does not rank in the top 25 major arms exporters as per the Report.

To gain perspectives on these issues, the author was able to interview Siemon T. Wezeman Senior Researcher with the SIPRI programme and coauthor of the Report.

The Interview

Wezeman clarified the parameters used in The Report and provided insights on how India could rank as an importer and of exporter of weapons in the future

On the import front, Wezeman clarified that SIPRI captures data of arms that have been designed in the country and not licence produced.

In the case of India most of the arms produced in the country may be manufactured but are not designed in India. Thus, these do not quality as indigenous as per SIPRI standards even though large components for these may be sourced and produced in India.

India’s deficiency in designing of large platforms is thus evident. The attempts by the Ministry of Defence to give priority to the Indigenous Design and Developed category in procurement may overcome this deficit but only if this is focused on large platforms and not ancillaries and sub systems.

Wezeman pointed out that naval platforms in India are an exception as the designing has been done mostly in India including the Aircraft Carrier INS Vikrant [IAC 1]. 

While this flies the Russian made MIG 29 and soon the French supplied Rafale M, this counts as an indigenous production and not import.

Measuring Indigenous Defence Production

Wezeman highlighted the SIPRI Report published in 2022 “Arms-Production Capabilities In The Indo-Pacific Region” which specifically measures indigenous production in Asia Pacific countries in which India’s is recorded as 16 percent. This once again reflects the fact that indigensous designing is limited and even, “domestic designs remain dependent on imported key component such as engines and radars”.

Apart from the naval platforms, Siemon T. Wezeman also identified strategic systems and platforms as INS Arihant as indigenous given that technology is not shared by any partner for such systems.

By the SIPRI standards thus it may be a long time before India can come out of the largest arms importer bracket as more imports are in the offing

For instance, the SIPRI Report also notes that, “India’s recent orders or planned orders—including up to 140 combat aircraft from France and 6 submarines from Germany—indicate its continued and probably increasing reliance on foreign suppliers”.

Reports in the Indian media which need to be confirmed also indicate that India is planning to order five batteries of the S 400 air and missile defence system from Russia ostensibly after its success in Operation Sindoor the clash with Pakistan in May 2025. Surprisingly though if these reports are accurate, Russia is yet to provide two batteries contracted in 2018 given priority for deployment in the War in Ukraine.

In a discussion during the interview, it emerged that India’s combat aircraft programme is one of the critical factors in this designation. The slow progress in the Tejas iterations – from Mark 1 to 1 A and 2 as well as AMCA denote that it would be a long time before indigenisation is reached.

Nevertheless, Wezeman stated that no country apart from the United States is capable of full indigenisation and depend on partners, thus having joint ventures with defence companies with high technology content may be the way ahead.

Apart from the US only China has made considerable progress in domestic defence manufacturing and is not dependent on others for supplies.

There is greater willingness to share technology and joint ventures with India particularly in Europe given recent progress in India Europe relations including in defence and security. Moreover, India is seen as a large market and has large pool of technical manpower particularly in the software sector.

India will have to realistically seek technology transfer as sharing of design knowledge is unlikely including software source codes.

On Defence Exports

On India’s defence exports, the qualifier for SIPRI remains large systems designed in India to be counted in the kitty. While the Indian MOD publishes data on exports which includes export approvals for all items including ancillaries, sub systems and so on these are not captured in the SIPRI Report as major exports

Thus, explaining the variation in the Indian data and the SIPRI Report wherein India does not figure in the first 25 arms exporters in the World which ironically includes Iran.

Impact of the US/Israel Iran War

On the US /Israel Iran War impacting export of Israeli systems to India, Wezeman remarked that Israel has developed a strong production base and is having joint ventures in India.

Moreover, Israel is being supplied large quantum of arms by the United States for employment in the War in the Gulf.

Thus, despite the ongoing war in the gulf, Israel will be able to provide Indian requirements in the future.

Case for Europe and India Defence Industry Collaboration

As European arms build-up is expanding, Wezeman highlighted that there is ample scope for joint ventures with India particularly in programmes as the Sixth Generation Fighter aircraft.

Indian decision makers will have to act fast as at least two transnational programmes in which India could participate are Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) (UK, Italy, Japan) which merges with UK’s Tempest, Italy’s industrial contributions, and Japan’s F-X program and the Future Combat Air System (FCAS/SCAF) (France, Germany, Spain, Belgium).

Indian manufacturers also can be a part of the supply chain of major systems with the European companies in the quest for enhancing defence production which will be for mutual benefit.

Recommendations Based on the Interview for Indian Policy Makers, R & D and Defence Industry

Based on the interview some broad recommendations for Indian policy makers emerge summarised as given below: -

• Focus on designing large platforms – replicate warship design model.

• Don’t aim for full indigenisation, exploit attractiveness of India as a large market and technology pool for joint ventures

• Expand exports of large weapons systems and platforms

• Seek Joint Ventures with Europe.

• Improve pace of defence acquisitions from the design to deployment stage, this appears to be a core factor which despite the Draft DAP 2026 does not provide hope in speeding up acquisitions.