A. Defence Manufacturing and Acquisition

1.  As mentioned above, local defence manufacturing by local private players has received lot of support. A number of Indian companies are now manufacturing all of or major components for missiles, small arms, howitzers, vehicles and various other equipments.  1* 2* 4*
2. Issue of critical ammunition shortfall has been addressed by giving greater autonomy to armed forces, revamping production at OFB and setting up of private manufacturing plants.  – 3* 
3.  Local weapon systems like Akash Surface to Air Missile, 4*  Light Combat Aircraft Tejas fighter 5* and Nag Anti Tank Guided Missile (ATGM) 6* have received much better and their long pending induction in armed forces expedited.
4.  Development and manufacturing of small arms in India has received a major boost in last 4 years. A number of locally designed and made guns have already been inducted in various state police and paramilitary forces .11* 12* 13* 14* 15*
5.  Long pending acquisitions and upgrades of essential items for soldiers like armour, helmets and guns have been approved.  Induction of these items was pending for decades. 7* 8* 16* 17*
6.  Critical issue of shortage of artillery guns has been solved by fast track development and induction of various Indian as well as foreign systems. These have been the first induction of artillery by Indian army since Bofors howitzer in 1986.  18* 19* 20* 21* 22* 23* 24*
7.  Long pending and seemingly dead deal for India Air Force MRCA (Dassault Rafale) finally signed at good terms. -79*

1.  Some of essential projects like Arjun are still stuck due to battles between Army and DRDO.  In my opinion based on available open source information, army is being very unreasonable here. 25*
2.  A number of naval projects like  submarines, Vikrant aircraft carrier, ships are delayed and seemingly no steps have been taken to rectify sub-par performance of local shipyards. 26* 27* 28*
3.  Project for next generation of Infantry Combat Vehicles ( to replace BMP) has made very slow progress.  29*

B. Terrorism, Border and Internal security

1. Cross border strikes against terrorist targets in Pakistan and Myanmar have sent a strong message and raised morale.35* 36* 37* . There have been various other small scale operations against pakis which haven’t received that much coverage. 38*
2.  Area under Maoist influence has shrunk quite a bit. Good intelligence work, better connect with locals and coordination between different state police forces and paramilitary forces has yielded good results. 30* 31* 32* 33* 34*
3.  Indian Army and BSF have been given  greater autonomy to handle mischief by Pakis at border. It has yielded some good results and raised confidence of soldiers. Even BSF is regularly bashing up Paki posts which fire or try to insert terrorists. Pakis have now begged to enforce 2003 ceasefire agreement again. 39* 40* 41* 52*
4. Overground workers, financiers and various other supporters of muslim terrorists in J&K have been raided and arrested not just in the state, but outside too. 42* 43* 44* 45*
5. Shelters, aid and other facilities to victims of cross border shelling by pakis is being provided. It’s still not enough, but is first step for a long pending need. 55*
6. Border issues with China have seen India get a bit more vocal and assertive compared to previous incidents. It has not been perfect, but still better than what we used to see earlier. Steps are being taken to reduce Chinese advantages like construction of border roads,  raising of dedicated military units and airfields 65* 66* 67* 68* 69* 70*
7. One of the biggest improvements is visible in number of terrorist attacks and resulting causalities. Since 2014, there has been a massive drop in number of terrorist incidents in India outside J&K. 80* 81*

1. This regime isn’t immune to appeasement policies when it comes to muslims leading to stupid decisions like ceasefire during ramzan. There have been some good successes against armed terrorists in Kashmir but issue of unarmed terrorists like the type who pelt stones and their supporters has not been adequately addressed.46*. After terrorist attack in Pathankot, we invited Pakistanis for a so called joint investigation. 48*
2. Khalistani militants continue to make noise and try to be a nuisance in some foreign countries. They have not been countered effectively. 47*
3. Resettlement of Kashmiri Hindus back in Kashmir is still not done. Very few steps have been taken to ensure that the displaced Hindus get their properties back 53* 54*
4. Issue of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar has been a major failure. They have been allowed to settle in many parts of India and existing ones have not been deported. 50* 51*
5. No progress of taking PoK back or support of locals there against paki hegemony.
6. Forces involved in counter insurgency operations should have received better moral support from the government. Admittedly, it is just a point of view, but there have been incidents where soft jihadi Mufti regime in J&K (of which BJP is a part) has tried to implicate and harass security forces in fake cases. With BJP as partner in the govt, people had expected much stricter action against jihadi kashmiri muslims. But Mufti and her colleagues seem to be in control of administration. 76* 77*

C. Other Defence Issues

1. For the first time, women are being given combat roles in Air Force, Coast Guard and various other branches like Assam Rifles.  56* 57* 58* 59*
2. One Rank One Pension has been rolled out. It is not perfect and the events leading up to it’s implementation were avoidable. But the basic work has been done and the veterans have started to receive their dues. 60* 61* 62*
3. Indian Ministry Of Defence has decided to not challenge disability pension for soldiers. 63*

1. There has been very little progress in resolving the issue of disparity between pay of civilian and military officers. 64*
2. Some stupid decisions like opening up of cantonment roads for civilian traffic 71* 72* which was later reversed. 73*
3. Spending on defence has not been up to expectations. 75*
4. Arun Jaitley was given additional charge of defence ministry for quite some time. These departments need two separate heads, not a single person juggling the two jobs. 74*

VERDICT:

FINAL SCORE: 8/10

SOURCES: