India’s Arms Import Fall By 21%, SIPRI

Table of Contents

What has happened?

The latest report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) on Trends in International Arms Transfer, 2021, released in March 2022,
Reveals that India and Saudi Arabia had emerged as the largest arms importers of arms between 2017-21, each accounting for 11% of all global arms sales.

The report places India at the top of the list.
Egypt, Australia and China were the next three largest importers with respective shares of 5.7%, 5.4% and 4.8%.
However, according to SIPRI, India’s total volume of imports fell by 21% from 2012-16, which could be a reflection of the push to manufacture arms and weapons systems indigenously.
India was the only country among the top five whose imports had declined during the said period.

It is significant that 85% of India’s imports were from just three countries: Russia (46%), France (27%), and USA (12%).
However, punitive sanctions imposed on Russia by the USA and its North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) allies, including France, for its invasion of Ukraine had created a dilemma for India and Accounted for it repeatedly abstaining from voting against Moscow in the United Nations General Assembly over its militarism.
With more than 60% -according to some estimates, 80-85%- of the equipment operated by its armed forces being of Russian-origin,
India cannot afford to support these sanctions without serious operational consequences.
At the same time, it cannot also ignore the incessant pressure from the USA and its allies to be categorical in condemning Russia’s brazen invasion of Ukraine.

India’s imports of Russian arms dropped by 47% between the two periods as several large programmes for Russian arms wound down.
This, combined with India’s increased efforts to diversify its arms supplier base, meant that Russia’s share of total Indian arms imports fell from 69% to 46%.
In contrast, India’s arms imports from France increased more than tenfold, making it India’s second largest arms supplier in 2017–21.

The volume of global arms transfers between 2017 and 2021 was 6% less than during the 2012-16 period, the report says.
The 2017-21 global arms transfers were, however, 3.9% more than for the 2007-11 period, it adds.

When it came to exports, the US, Russia, France, China, and Germany accounted for nearly 77% of global arms exports during the 2017-21 period, the report says.
While exports from France and the US went up, those from China and Russia fell during the 2017-21 period.
The US exported nearly 108 times more arms than Russia during 2017-21, the report adds.

India, which was the 24th largest exporter during 2016-20 has improved its position by one notch to 23rd in 2017-21,
With a share of just 0.2% of the global exports, far from its avowed goal of reaching USD 5 billion by 2025.

The foremost challenge for India in this is to make inroads into markets which account for a bulk of global imports.
Nothing illustrates this better than China’s rise as an arms exporter, due largely to its sales to Pakistan which increased from 38% in 2016-20 to 47% in 2017-21.
Conversely, 72% of Pakistan’s imports during 2017-21 were expressly from China.

Q) India observes National Anti-Terrorism day to mark the death anniversary of?