The DRDO reforms Iss.3 ( 31/10/2023)                                                                                                                                                             Prof. Prodyut Das

Recently the Government of India constituted a committee to look into the workings of DRDO with an intent of improving its performance. This has caused a sense of grievance in certain quarters. Indeed, one periodical ran a piece with the rather preemptory heading “Don’t touch the DRDO”.

On 4^th October 2023 the first Tejas Trainer was handed over to the IAF in front of the Air Chief and in the presence of the Raisina and other dignitaries. All the jollities appropriate to such an occasion were observed and the worn- out promises implied that better production were just around the corner.

If we remove the proper nouns to avoid emotional associations the occasion was the handing over of a first example of a product ordered 21 years ago. Despite the delay the product continues to be  below par. There is no assurance that the remaining seven will be delivered to any schedule. My estimate is we shall be lucky if this year we get a further 2 because the programme like Kipling’s native “obeys no orders unless they are his very own”.   

The Tejas programme is by far and away an all- time outlier in the history of weapons development. It holds lessons of what NOT to do. Even the “successful” of DRDO programmes are neither timely nor satisfactory; Those with experience will know just how badly delayed and inefficient the programmes are. A more effective weapons development system is needed. The present Government feels the need for improvement and that such improvements are possible with management.

1.      The Expertise of the Committee

The Committee constituted to look into this problem has eminent Industry men on board and also a good cross section of the Services but their contribution and effectiveness will depend on how much weightage their inputs will be given because there of the Hierarchy.

 The Committee also follows the Colonial Practice of having a Professor as the Chairman. The fear is his good name would be an ornamental “Tulsi leaf” or window dressing to reassure the Tax payer that a fair wise decision has been taken. The LCA development Committee also had an eminent Professor on board.  A former student of the Professor grossly lacking in Industrial experience  was selected allegedly over other candidates to head the project after the most experienced A/c designer was eased out by questions raised  (planted?)  in Parliament. There is really no justification in roping in Academicians into Industrial reorganization- the job needs the specialists with knowledge. With no reference to this particular case the Academic campuses are no longer the leaders in Industrial technology; Project management, which is germane to the present being a still further cry. I am generalizing but Academicians hate treading on anyone's corns.

2.      Project Monitoring and Der Oberbefehelshaber

The German word for The Supreme Commander is Oberbefehelshaber; (Tr, Gr: “Chief Order Haver” e.g. Supreme Commander) looks at the process not from the point of issuing the order but receiving the consequences of the issued order. In the terminology of Instrument & Controls the German word is what would be called “Closed loop feed- back control” i. e. an order is issued and its consequences are received and presumably examined for necessary correction. This element of “feed- back control” is missing.  DRDO projects work in splendid isolation .

 The Chairmanship of the project should go to the Customer - the “OberBefehelshaber” because it is ostensibly at his behest that product or technology is being developed. An Industrialist ordering a machine has considerable control over the process- choice, price, vendor reputation- thus ensuring his satisfaction. The process also listens to the “head” technicians or the knowledge people both of the vendor and the customer the “Owner” which in this case is the Forces the  Government confining himself to the Commercial and Administrative Leadership much in the manner a Sea Captain listens to his Navigator.

3.      A decision pre-arranged?

 In the present DRDO project management process the customer and the knowledge people appear  to be  “ancillaries” to the higher direction-the secretaries & bureaucrats- whose ideas take precedence over respect for the customer and respect for the technical challenges. For the sake of efficiency DRDO as vendors should defer to the Services as Customer for control of the review of the project; Vayu/Sena/NauSena Bhavan being entrusted with the Chairmanship of the Committee and reporting the progress to the PMO. This scenario is difficult to imagine but sine qua non.  Primacy of the Customer is essential to avoid picnics that too many project have become. 

4.       Democracy supra Hierarchy

The Customer is always right is an enduring principle and it is the customer who is to be satisfied the old exhortation was satisfy him or convert him to your point of view. The present structure the Secretaries (the Head of DRDO for example), out rank the senior most Service representatives (AVMs, Air Cdre. present and thus hold all the trump. In a real world scenario it is like the Vendor dictating to the customer. The real “where the shoe pinches” knowledge and know how is even lower down the table amongst the squalor of Wg. Cdrs and Senior Design Engineers and Scientist “C” s but they hold their tongue because they are brushed aside if they speak. The Ministries take a decision based on the lofty ( and sometimes not so lofty ) big picture rather than arrive at a decision by assembling a solution from the small elements of the many problems. By current procedures this has to be ratified by the hapless ( junior) “Customer” as an unavoidable fait accompili. It is a recipe for bluffing, delay and poor work quality because unlike in real life the Customer has no clout in the proceedings. This is the scenario that played out with the Tejas.

The current “Senior Officer present” syndrome needs to be wisely counter balanced by some form of weighted voting which gives fair respect to the opinions of all stakeholders. At present there is consciousness of a hierarchy; the domain experts remain silent, the “powerful” impose, and the Chairman- a “Professor Vicar de Bray” – who is in no way affected if the project fails- will sign on the dotted line i.e. the decision as has been hijacked by the lobbyist rather than arrived at by the wise. The machinations of the Import Lobby exist because the present structure is vulnerable to lobbies in the North and South blocks.

5.      Effects of Laissez Faire: The ADE Tapas crash

The present DRDO is an organization that uses Public Funding but is de facto self- proposing, self-assessing, self- certificating and self- congratulating. It is a "Family and Friends"  business. Unfortunately it does not have to depend on it’s development skills for survival. Pity! The recent crash of the ADE Tapas project and the concurrent interest in the Reaper encapsulates what will continue to happens if DRDO is unreformed. truth to tell I feel that DRDO has expertise at the sub systems level but lack totally- and that is no surprise given its background- any worthwhile expertise in integration of systems onto platforms

A family and Friends Business 

ADE was established in 1959 and remained a typical quiet low- cost low harm Establishment of the era of rosy dreams and Keynesian economics slumbering in harmless existence though ostensibly set up for the development of Aeronautical structures and propulsion systems. Starting in the ‘80s when a Scientist with Electronics as specialization became its director ADE transformed to a comparative high budget establishment largely slanted to Avionics, Software, Computers and Simulators-not with any particular success but with the usual delays and delivery problems and unfitness for real world operations e.g. Tejas simulators. In this transformation the Aeronautical Structures and Propulsion capability was evidently neglected.

 It was thus perhaps inevitable that when the Tapas airframe was designed ADE had inadequate in skills and experience in airframe design had decayed to an extent that it is visible in the shoddy aerodynamic detailing of the Tapas airframe- glaring mistakes of a kind a village blacksmith would be ashamed to make! I have read and heard e.g. unconfirmed reports that the airframe was designed by someone relatively junior and unskilled and teh airframe shows. 

It speaks volumes of training retainability of talent and selection process that the Project Directors and all those Senior scientists who approved and released the drawings that they failed to spot the obvious outrage- aesthetically if not aerodynamically. The sustained political interference in education systems has been subjected to since 1947 must also be blamed for this decline in overall quality.

 Unverified reports speak of a structural failure of the Tapas airframe indicate laziness, lack of enthusiasm and engineering knowledge, bungling. cover up and misuse of mandates i.e. a failure of project Leadership at all levels. There were allegedly great deviations in manufacturing, possible QC problems with the vendor (Aeronautical Quality composites manufacture is certainly not for the average Indian MSMEs unless properly guided. Aside: Wait for further delays in Tejas!) all this made worse by wrongly manufactured components internally condoned and certified for flight by CEMILAC like NFTC is also DRDO controlled. Funds come from South Bloc who are Indulgent to anything sniffing of Socialism and Keynes.

To amplify the last line above: This class of UAVs have +/- 2.5 g design load factor not +9/-4.5 of a fighter. +/- 2.5  is so marginal that there was no margin for any shortfall in “g” strengths to clear the aircraft for any testing. Structural failure would be inevitable. In Aviation it is Citius Altius Commoda Periculus Sapientas- Higher and faster by taking wise risks! In this case the  periculus taken was certainly not Sapientas! Wise risks note Wise- when the specified margin itself is 2.5 it was not wise to allow ANY shortfall and the sanctioning authority should have been common sense and  mature engineer enough to appreciate that there is no margin for any accommodation. This decision could have happened only if the decider had a sense of security that everything -including “accident” investigation was all in the family and misjudgments would be expunged.  Consequences? The case to import is strengthened. Reaper, anyone?

Any ownership would have asked when ADE Management switched to Avionics “Are you running a Hobby shop?”  but the guiding spirit appears to have been that as long as there was publicity and funds were coming in it was commendable, Rectitude was lacking.

 Requisite expertise to set the project right fast is available within India but DRDO has been extremely chary of “external” i.e. "external" barring a set of courtiers Academicians and DRDO  Alumni- help because possibly there are simply too many skeletons in every one of its cupboards. A fine mess - of Leadership, lack of interest, evasion of problems and suppression of skills leading to waste delay and continued imports. It is also a concern that because the platform failed the sub systems will not be commercialized and the IP of the various systems developed will be exposed for leakage to ”foreign” interests.      

Corrections are small

Corrections are needed and they are few and small.

If we look at the present Litany of the Customer’s/ DRDO woes it can be summed up as;

1.      The product development is delayed

2.      The product is too expensive

3.      The product does not meet specifications

4.      The design is not very producible.

5.      Specifications are changed from time to time

These are actually interrelated to delay so if the delay can be tackled the Domino effect will largely mitigate the others resulting in a very significant improvement.

 Relying on the Domino effect 

The Committee will fail if it tries to do too much. It should confine itself to reforming one or two major areas and a few minor areas- no spring cleaning because it is a case of tackling the “bottleneck” which is unfailingly at the top of the bottle. The Committee should perhaps tackle:

1.Delays in the administrative “slab” between PMO and South Block in sanctioning DRDO projects,

2.Changing project monitoring from self -assessment by DRDO - which is "self certification" from Preliminary design to  to a flight clearance to Flight tests by DRDO agencies. Customer led assessment and monitoring of the “Vendor “ would reduce hush ups.

3.Synchronizing and reducing review periodicity so that the “promiser” is personally present when the order is being “had” i.e. being delivered or explain the failure. A couple of rounds of that will expose any "habitual Liar" and teh Customer can ask for a fresh manager.

4. Reviewing project costs in Present Day Value (PDV) rupees.

The Domino effects will usually take care of the rest.   

1.      The first Domino; Delay within the corridors of Raisina.

Organizations are living organisms. They react to the environment and to externa stimuli. An uncontrolled delay in sanctioning of a project sends an encrypted message that the Government or the “Maalik”- the Hindustani word for Master- is pre-occupied with other things and is not really monitoring. It is a signal to laissez faire. Air India -shortly after de-nationalization-sent out a circular that the bindi of the air hostesses should be of a particular size and colour.  This caused much amusements to observers but it was a very intelligent ploy sending the message that the Maalik-the boss’s boss- was interested in the organization and would be keeping an eye in detail.  

Finally, a certain morality of command- fairly common in the services– don’t ask the men to do something you can’t do yourself- is involved. The Ministry will not have the authority to asks DRDO to expedite when it itself is guilty of delay.

The 2^nd Domino: Changing the weightage of the monitoring authority

The present system of project monitoring is self- assessment by DRDO. The customer’s dissatisfaction is ignored and motives imputed in the report written by the Member Secretary (who outranks the Customer- that goes to the Finance Desk of the PMO.

 The knowledgeable engineers do not have the authority to shut down project that are clearly going nowhere. Then Air Cdre. Krishnaswamy and Wg.Cdr RV Singh should have had the authority to close down the Tejas project unless ADA addressed the objections raised. It would have saved much time because now we are having to do everything twice firstly wrongly and then trying to correct on hardware. We also have a touching belief in Keynesian economics i.e. any and every Public Expenditure is somehow beneficial. Infructuous expenditure then leads to further infructuous expenditure. Since audits are internal to the Government and DRDO outranks the Services Chiefs, much finances are wasted and encourages the incompetent to misadventure. Letting the Customer (and the “Knowledge” people) decide the programme would prevent cases which I personally would call “lying through the Teeth” unscrupulous. No amount of “we overpromised and underquoted” accompanied by toothy grin- confessions by the concerned high official ten years after the near irreparable damage is done can rectify the criminal consequences.  

The 3^rd Domino: Synchronizing and reducing review periodicity

 In the present set up A Programme Director appears before the “monitoring Authority” comfortable in the knowledge that the same Reviewing person will not be there at the next review and he himself will not be there when the “chips are down”. A look at any of the annual reports of the Establishments have in the first few pages has an impressive list of Minsiters, Secretaries and Service Representatives who are supposedly monitoring the project. Re-check. None of the order “havers” are there when the time of reckoning. Sometimes there is a double change of the Havers.; Conveniently the Scientist making the commitment has retired when the delivery has failed. The review reduces to an audition to new people of excuses and false promises by practiced exponents of “propagatio falsi suppression veri” who have also mastered the art of writing incomprehensively and speaking evasively.  

The Bureaucracy speak of continuity of Organization, people are replaceable in a system etc but it don’t work that way in weapons development. It is to be noted that the Tejas project was re-financed -without increased supervision despite no tangible progress and not a gramme of hardware in TEN years at a time when there were four changes of Government. Continuity of “order having”  and Owner Interest is an important essential.

Domino 4. Reviewing in Present Day Rupees

The standard practice worldwide is to give project costs in present day currency values. DRDO deviates-and I am sorry to  say this- quite possibly deliberately so as to give a low figure confuse. In US project reviews the total development and programme costs are in in “present day dollars” and the year is given. This is essential.

 According to the method used by DRDO an arithmetic addition of all sums is done aimed at giving the impression of a very low expenditures. Thus, according to the DRDO a sum of Rs 15,400 crores has been spent in developing the Tejas Mk1. The actual value of this sum, corrected for inflation is over Rs.100,000 crores (about 280 tons of Gold) only up to IOC1. This compares with about 207 tons of gold expended for full certification of the F 16. Low cost of  R&D is a sedulously fostered myth.

The “confusion” created in declaring the value of wealth spent in a project allows not just ADA but the “Import Lobby” Bureaucrats to turn a Nelsonian blind eye to continue funding projects that will go nowhere- and lead up to imports. The import Lobby gets to import and the Scientist Babus get free funds – it is peaceful co-operative co- existence all the way! Declaration of Expenditures in real value terms would make it difficult to fund projects as lib without making management corrections,   

Comparisons with foreign programmes vs Indian programmes must be adjusted for the higher cost of foreign HR costs. The formula can be 20% Capital cost + 80% HR costs x ratio of difference in Aerospace Labour cost. For US a rough comparative cost is 0.35 of USD cost. i.e. A programme that costs USD 1 Billion should be valued at USD 350 million in India as we pay our Engineers Indian and not US salaries.    

The fall of the Dominos.

DRDO in the ‘80s went in for an aggressive, proactive expansion but lacked the depth of management and technical experience required. Laboratory apparatus experience cannot be used to develop Industry ready products. The result was a quagmire of failed projects.

The question to ask is that in post Liberalization India what expertise does DRDO bring to the table to justify its role as a bungling “middleman” in the process of development of mobile platforms? 

If it does develop any applicable technology that can be bought by the Lead Integrator.  Why should Labs like ADA or NAL (DST) lead, engage and indeed re- engage in the development of weapons platforms when they have failed significantly. Empire Building? Is employment of the few more urgent than national needs? In any case the HR can be shifted but should defaulting Labs be allowed to continue in areas they have inherent handicaps because they are not Industry and will not ever have the level of skill and outlook.

A share of the problem of a non-functioning DRDO rests with the Governments in New Delhi. Some of the Governments since Independence e.g. 2004-2014 being notable. The flip side of the any such situation i.e. simple steps not being taken, is that progress can be made if the simple common sense corrections being taken.

 External and knowledgeable audit of progress of projects, holding the promiser to the task, change in the frequency and triggers for project reviews and quoting budget expenditure in PDV will cut down the confusion created by officials. Independent audit of funds, delays and failures, rapid corrections will lead to greater accountability. This will edge out the charlatans who are opposing corrections because of the exposure of incompetence that will follow. 

Flogging a dead Horse

The time has come to admit that expecting a Bureaucracy controlled DRDO to deliver defence products is flogging a dead horse. Successful Businesses- and Industrial R&D is a business- requires continuity, interest, hard work, continuous monitoring, domain knowledge, passion combined with risk taking, venturesomeness, swiftness of decision, acumen, dedication and hard work etc. These are not possible in a multi- party democracy -winning elections every five years, governing a country and running successful businesses is together too much of a task.

The idea of a Public Sector engaging in Industry is Marxist. Marx held that Private Property was the root of all social evil and that the Workers must own the means of production. He was in his 20s and early 30s when he propounded this and in this, he jumped the gun a bit- the Industrial Revolution was still unfolding; his “exposure to “realities was a six- month stint in Manchester and his contention was hasty, immature and perhaps deliberately not based on facts.

 In India Marxist polemics and economic theories were propounded because the  PSUs- like the Planning Commission- were extra constitutional force multipliers for the Congress Leftist Elite that were eased into the helm in 1947. The Bureaucracy was a enthusiastic collaborator because State Control meant greater authority for them, The possibilities of corruption under the License Permit Raj must have had its attractions to many. The Welfare of the people had very little to do with the professions of social welfare.

Part truths (<0.5) like the Tata Commissions of 1944 are still cited to justify State control of “the commanding Heights of the economy”. No periodic review of the 1944 discussions were held. The plea for State Dominance carefully overlooked that despite all the constraints imposed by a Colonial Rule the Indian Entrepreneurs of pre Independence were able to fund, set up and run at a profit competitive advanced Industries in all the leading areas of that time including Textiles, Shipbuilding, Rolling Stock, Aviation, Automobiles, Steels (including alloy steels) and every other field of Technical Endeavour and the entrepreneurs were farsighted and benevolent enough to include investing sagaciously and severally in Higher Education.

The State control of the Economy was a disaster for the common man whose magnitude can be gauged by the affluence following the enforced Liberalization of 1993 - after the Economy had collapsed in 1993 from decades of the depredations of Marxist economics. The same is both an indication of the extent of current decay and the improvement we can expect if Defence Industry including Defence Resarch- were liberalized. There was never any justification for the PSU and DRDO. It was “selfishness” of a ruling minority “Indian” in but name and one that was a collaborator/hostage to the CCCP. The Western Powers did not interfere because no one wanted an India that was “Nationalist” and an Industrial Giant. Possibly all :Great Gamers-UK/CCCP/US- felt that one Japan was enough!

The privatization of DRDO or its parts of it would have exciting outcomes. The rise of Japan post WW2 happened because the Japanese HR who had contributed to excellent Japanese weapons e.g Kaiten or the Yagi came into the world of Sony and Toyota. The rest is History.    

Additional notes

The subject is vast; I add some comments, observations and anecdotes below to illustrate the thoughts on which I have based the above. The reader will remember that many DRDO labs have shunned the limelight but made major contributions and can do still better but then there are those other labs!

ISRO is held up as a shining example and indeed ISRO has made us proud but the management model of ISRO is different and will fail if applied to DRDO.  There are significant differences:

i)                 The rate of change of specifications is much slower in ISRO than in DRDO. A 10 year delay for an ISRO project e.g, cryogenic engine does not require much redesign but a ten years is half- life for a military specifications. DRDO has to develop to fairly strict time slots or it will be developing obsolescence.

ii)                DRDO equipment has to be mass produced. In addition to incorporating fairly advanced technology, DRDO products have to be engineered to be produced en masse and at low cost. The ability to engineer a quality product for mass production is not a commonly available skill even in the West and engineers with such skills are prized and the sad fact is that the average DRDO Scientist does not have indeed cannot have the “engineering for mass production” skills or abilities.

 

i)                 Debate on the specifications issued. This is badly needed because we have fallen behind in many fields and must innovate. Here DRDO is on weak ground because its  leadership lacks the level of subject knowledge and the interest. They can neither contribute nor understand the need for a particular point of the specification. Sullen attempt at compliance is followed by mutual recrimination after the delay.

 The need for “Democracy” within the Committee is essential. During the panic development of the British Radar based interception (equipment and system) happened in record time in spite of being untried technology because the people who had the “hands on” knowledge had an equal if not a decisive say in the deliberations. Their knowledge i.e the knowledge of the hands-on practical men decided what would be the specifications that could be delivered within the time available. Legend had it that fairly lowly ranked people e.g. technicians and radar mechanics for example, could discuss and present viewpoints that contradicted or challenged the senior Scientists and Air Vice Marshals in meets that came to be called “Soviets”. How that “democracy” was organized- and mind you this in the Class-conscious Britain of the ‘30s- may be worth a re-look.

One has to see the deference and importance with which the Head Mistry or Engineer of a successful MSME is treated by the Owner to appreciate the degree of importance the technical competent people play in the development of a product. One does not see the same deference to “knowledge” in one's visits to DRDO labs.

 The present system of project assessment is de facto a self- assessment by DRDO and its supporting South Block Bureaucracy. In the Tejas programme assessment in 1993 i.e. that after 10 years and the expenditure of the equivalent of approximate Rs. 6000 Crores current Rupees not one gramme of hardware had been developed as against a promise nota bene of a first flight of prototype in April 1990. No re-organization/replacement of the unsuccessful management was done and the blatant non-performance was encouraged despite knowledgeable Customer objections given in writing, Public Funds worth another Rs.6000 crores PDV was given without any management changes. Whilst the Tejas project management is an outlier the Tapas programme also shows the same distressing symptoms. It is the same model everywhere and consequently outcomes are “chancy”.

The need for the Services to allow discussions of the specifications they issue is important though admittedly the average DRDO scientists lack the knowledge and they will not hire outside of a pool of “compliant” pool of Academics. & DRDO alumnus. A lot of trouble in developing the 5^th and 6^th generation combat aircraft could be avoided by fair debate. Another example is the Arjun tank. Close and co-operative liaison with the Army would have resulted in saving of much time and money as well as disappointment and acrimony. The Army will need over 800 Arjuns from the Kutch to Khem Karan and the CVRDE instead of rona dhona should have, like Vickers, who converted the 60 tons Centurion to 35 tons Vickers 37  Vijayanta ( same engine ,gun and transmission with lighter protection) done a similar effort with the  Arjun- Abhimanyu perhaps! 

Note

Instead of the best specifications the Forces should honestly attempt to  see what is the minimum to do the job. The British Radar development was a race against time. Their Radars were  technologically inferior to the Germans e.g. the Seetakt or the Wurzburg. The worried Germans sent the airship Graf Zepplin on elint missions along the south east coast once the Chain Home radar masts were put up in 1938. The Graf Zepplin found nothing and became puzzled and confused about the purpose of the towers because the Germans- overestimating British Radar development prowess and progress- scanned for frequencies much much higher than what the British were actually using. Lower frequencies meant less accuracy of information on position of the target but the programme, led by an experienced actual engineer, knew that the crude device “the third best” a phrase he frequently used to define his radar would do the job. "Third best" was pragmatic. A delayed best specification is of no use.

Note 3

Keeping an eye and making it be known is a wondrous management tool. The recent strong resistance – much loud agitation about academic freedom being trampled - of a (supposedly) “A” grade University to the installation of CCTVs after the death -possibly murder-of a first year student, is an illustration of the psychological effect of being under the scanner has on the mala fide. The agitation is also a grim sign of the degree of organized infiltration of national facilities by those with undesirable agendas.

Note 4

Stanley Hooker who reputedly had “engineering” thumbs like some gardeners have “green” thumbs, left his parent Company Rolls Royce after a brilliant carrier (Nene, Derwent, Avon -quite apart from his war-winning work on Merlin and Griffons superchargers during 1938-1953) ) for Bristol due to some acrimony and misunderstandings about prospects. When Rolls Royce got into trouble over the RB211 in the early 70s and was not too proud to ask Hooker back. The popular story was that RR had taken over Bristol Siddeley to get Hooker. Hooker got the RB 211 quickly out of trouble using “instinctive” engineering. His very readable autobiography  “Not much of an Engineer” – he did not have a formal degree in engineering-is strongly recommended for insights into the required “soft engineering” skills to anyone interested in Jet Engine development. Our Engineering problems are not much and in no way special.