Winning Bizness Desk

Mumbai. While India is preparing itself to face any war situation and is equipping itself with war-planes like Rafale and Iron Dome, country's own government–run ordinance factories are facing existential crisis. With a fleet of 70 thousand employees, the 222-year-old armament factories of the country, which have been converted into seven companies in 2021, have even started saying that the government is conspiring to destroy these factories. However, the government has called this process as corporatization and the intention behind it was to improve autonomy, accountability and efficiency in their armament supply by dividing them into smaller, better managed companies. But now 'All India Defense Employees Federation' i.e. AIDEF, the organization of employees of these companies, has written a letter to Defense Minister Rajnath Singh saying that the country will have to pay a heavy price for the conspiracy to destroy these armament factories. They have alleged that the present government has converted these factories into private companies, ignoring the advice of five former defense ministers.

Order book of govt ordinance factories zero

The employees have claimed that the Indian Army is now openly giving orders to the private sector instead of giving preference to government ordinance factories, while the order book of many government ordinance factories has become almost zero. He has claimed that at least 5 Defense Ministers in the governments of different parties at the Center - George Fernandes, Jaswant Singh, Pranab Mukherjee, AK Antony and Manohar Parrikar had said that armament factories will not be privatized and these factories will be used by the Army as before and will continue to supply arms, ammunition and other equipment. The employees of the ordinance factories are getting the support of many trade unions and all have said that this fight will continue until the corporatization of the government ordinance factories is withdrawn. They have vowed that they will not allow DRDO, armament factories and other defense industries to be destroyed. However, interestingly, initially a section of many employees supported corporatization and demanded a package from the government for the employees to join the 7 companies.

Ordnance factories are lying idle

The situation at the ground level of government ordinance factories is such that more than 50 percent of the ordinance factories in the country are lying idle due to lack of work and the companies are also struggling to pay the monthly salaries of the employees. Armies are placing orders at cheaper rates to private companies and they are getting supplies of poor quality weapons. The country will suffer the consequences of this. However, defense experts said that now the time has come for public-private partnership as well as competition. In such a situation, these government factories will also have to move with time. Otherwise they will be out.

Factories are 313 years old

According to historical documents, although the Gun and Shell Factory, earlier known as Kuippore Gun Carriage Agency, was established in 1801, the Ordnance Factory was established in 1712 when the Dutch Ostend Company established the Gun Carriage Agency in North Bengal. A gunpowder factory was established in Pargana. Even before 1801, other gunpowder and rifle factories were also established in the same area.