History of DRDO has been a chronicle of false claims, tall promises, inexplicable delays and sub-optimal products. The only success it has to its credit relates to replication of some imported products (commonly called %u2018reverse engineering%u2019 and %u2018indigenisation%u2019). Expending defence budget on developing new breeds of angora rabbits or newer varieties of orchids defies logic and reveals a total lack of focus. Many feel that DRDO%u2019s failure in high-tech areas has resulted in a crisis of identity - it has lost sight of its primary responsibility and resorted to delving in infructuous work to justify its existence.
Bharat Verma is bang on target when he says that there is a total lack of accountability as DRDO is not answerable to anyone. There is no external audit. Escalation in costs and deferment of completion dates are taken for granted. DRDO has been preventing import of urgently needed military systems by making confident assertions and promising indigenous products in the required time frame. Not one promise has ever been fulfilled. But no one has ever been taken to task for misleading the defence services, at times with grave consequences.
In 1997, India was on the verge of signing a contract for the import of Weapon Locating Radars (WLR) when DRDO intervened to scuttle the deal with claims that it would develop and produce them in two years. Mr APJ Kalam headed DRDO at that time. India went into the Kargil conflict without WLR and suffered hu
