All these delays and cost overruns could have been easily avoided if the Indian government hadn't kept harping on tot and shit!!What they should have done was to buy the Rafales off the shelf in fly away condition and then invest in setting up a chain of an extensive repairing cum overhauling facilities across various locations in country!!But instead,the governments,in all their wisdom,have always decided to go for some 'ToT' with their misplaced believe that somehow this can magically result in self reliance in fabricating world class equipment and have churned (wasted would be a more precise term to use) out huge sums of tax payers money over virtually nothing,(money which could and should have been used on various universities and R&D centers,to nurture and cultivate the talents and the in-country R&D) and look where it has brought us to!!Just imagine where we could have been and instead where we have ended up!!The situation now we are in as far as aeronautics go,can be termed nothing but plain sad!!Mr Prasun K Sengupta summed it up quite nicely and I'm paraphrasing here :
" No one in the world parts with any technology. They only part with industrial production methodologies & thgis is known as ToT. So, without the former, the latter becomes only licenced-production. Consequently, all this ToT can NEVER be applied for the development or production of any other product ...............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
As for India have to pay exorbitant amounts of money for weapons procurements & the kind ToT that never translates into indigenous product solutions, this has been going on since the 1960s itself with regard to the IAF. Why are you therefore so surprised with the Rafale? If you desire a product that is cheaper to buy then you have to forego this stupid & preposterous option of licenced-production. A Su-30MKI costs only Rs.242 crores if imported from Russia, but costs Rs.358 crores if built in India. Therefore,if you do the math, you will conclude that just for the sake of keeping less than 5,000 workers of HAL engaged in some form of industrial activity, India has had to fork out an extra Rs.35,000+ crores for licence-building 272 Su-30MKIs! What kind of economic/commercial logic is that? And in what way has all this effort helped India with the LCA’s R & D endeavours? You therefore need to rationalize & analyse with a cool head all these inputs, & not blindly believe all the trash & utter baloney that successive Govts of India have force-fed the Indian public about the mythical (not tangible) merits of licenced-production & self-sufficiency in defence production. In other words, a long overdue reality check is direly reqd. Remember, that Rs.35,000 crores could easily have been saved & invested in the Rafale project had the Govt of India decided to import the Su-30MKIs off-the-shelf. One should always get one’s priorities right. "
" No one in the world parts with any technology. They only part with industrial production methodologies & thgis is known as ToT. So, without the former, the latter becomes only licenced-production. Consequently, all this ToT can NEVER be applied for the development or production of any other product ...............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
As for India have to pay exorbitant amounts of money for weapons procurements & the kind ToT that never translates into indigenous product solutions, this has been going on since the 1960s itself with regard to the IAF. Why are you therefore so surprised with the Rafale? If you desire a product that is cheaper to buy then you have to forego this stupid & preposterous option of licenced-production. A Su-30MKI costs only Rs.242 crores if imported from Russia, but costs Rs.358 crores if built in India. Therefore,if you do the math, you will conclude that just for the sake of keeping less than 5,000 workers of HAL engaged in some form of industrial activity, India has had to fork out an extra Rs.35,000+ crores for licence-building 272 Su-30MKIs! What kind of economic/commercial logic is that? And in what way has all this effort helped India with the LCA’s R & D endeavours? You therefore need to rationalize & analyse with a cool head all these inputs, & not blindly believe all the trash & utter baloney that successive Govts of India have force-fed the Indian public about the mythical (not tangible) merits of licenced-production & self-sufficiency in defence production. In other words, a long overdue reality check is direly reqd. Remember, that Rs.35,000 crores could easily have been saved & invested in the Rafale project had the Govt of India decided to import the Su-30MKIs off-the-shelf. One should always get one’s priorities right. "
