i wonder why indian army and airforce dosent follow the foot steps of indian navy when it comes to buying or inducting domestic military hard ware
the answer is as simple as the question itself.
IN is the least funded force of India.It gets small share of indian defence budget.But IN has far more ambitions than its counterparts,like ruling seas and power projections.
With its penny sized budgets,it certainly cant afford buying from foreign vendors.Then realised an alternative of developing its most needed systems inhome.Started deputing its tech savy officers to DRDO labs or for creation of new labs.Though the initial projects were to realise an alternative indian system,today it was in a position to develop a competitive system.
If one looks at the naval labs,most of the people were from IN itself.Which is unlikely with IA or IAF.Since both these getting lion share of budget,they are taking the luxury of spending that on overseas products and reluctant on inducting a cheap competitive product from Indian companies.
A heavyweight torpedo developed by DRDO costs 1/4th of the same purchased from abroad.Same with all other products like Sonars,practise torpedoes,anti-sub guided rockets, batteries for D-E subs,...........
In short,all sucessive IN leaders were foresighted than compared to IA/IAF. IN 5 carrier requirement was laid down during the later 70`s after a sucessfull blockade of Karachi and chitagong.The 5 carrier battle group was mainly considered due to the american involvement in the war and sending of its CBG to warzone.As gov keep changes, IN failed to realise its wishlist,but went on forcing the MOD.With economy shining,IN is hoping that its wishlist will be fulfilled.
IN despatches its top brass to all R&D organisations in india,including BARC,ISRO,DRDO,IISc,TIFR,IITs,CISR..... on a regular basis to educate itself of new developments.And its an eyesore to see IA/IAF doing this.