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Warship Upgrading: CAG Pulls up Navy -The New Indian Express
At a time when Navy is fighting a perception battle over the safety of its assets, the Central auditors have rapped it for delays in executing the refits and upgrade of ageing warships, resulting in both time and cost overruns, apart from their non-availability for operations.
In its latest five-year performance audit from 2005-06 to 2009-10 period presented before Parliament on Tuesday, the CAG stressed the need for a more efficient management of planning and execution of refit and upgrade programmes. “While acknowledging that the Navy had been undertaking refits of aged ships of varied classes and origin, it was also admitted that there were considerable time and cost overruns, resulting in reduced availability of ship days,” the audit report observed.
It recommended “a more efficient management of planning and execution of refit, speedy completion of infrastructure project, better inventory management and timely supply of machinery and spares.”
The repairs and refits of naval ships are carried out at the two Naval Dockyards in Mumbai and Visakhapatnam and three Naval Ship Repair Yards in Port Blair, Kochi and Karwar. In addition, the Navy off-loads refits to defence public sector shipyards and commercial shipyards.
The nation’s major warships, including INS Vikramaditya (erstwhile Admiral Gorshkov of the Russian Navy), have been refitted and upgraded with modern equipment and system to make them worthy of modern day naval warfare. INS Sindhurakshak, which sunk in the Mumbai Naval Dockyard on August 14 last year due to internal explosions, had returned after an upgrade programme from Russia earlier that year.
The latest report revealed that 113 of the 152 refits planned in the five audit years were completed with an accumulated delay of 8,629 days. That constituted 74 per cent of the naval assets. Further, 66 refits were planned ab-initio in excess of the duration authorised under operational-cum-refit cycle, thereby resulting in an accumulated planned loss of 5,188 days in availability of the ships, it said.
At a time when Navy is fighting a perception battle over the safety of its assets, the Central auditors have rapped it for delays in executing the refits and upgrade of ageing warships, resulting in both time and cost overruns, apart from their non-availability for operations.
In its latest five-year performance audit from 2005-06 to 2009-10 period presented before Parliament on Tuesday, the CAG stressed the need for a more efficient management of planning and execution of refit and upgrade programmes. “While acknowledging that the Navy had been undertaking refits of aged ships of varied classes and origin, it was also admitted that there were considerable time and cost overruns, resulting in reduced availability of ship days,” the audit report observed.
It recommended “a more efficient management of planning and execution of refit, speedy completion of infrastructure project, better inventory management and timely supply of machinery and spares.”
The repairs and refits of naval ships are carried out at the two Naval Dockyards in Mumbai and Visakhapatnam and three Naval Ship Repair Yards in Port Blair, Kochi and Karwar. In addition, the Navy off-loads refits to defence public sector shipyards and commercial shipyards.
The nation’s major warships, including INS Vikramaditya (erstwhile Admiral Gorshkov of the Russian Navy), have been refitted and upgraded with modern equipment and system to make them worthy of modern day naval warfare. INS Sindhurakshak, which sunk in the Mumbai Naval Dockyard on August 14 last year due to internal explosions, had returned after an upgrade programme from Russia earlier that year.
The latest report revealed that 113 of the 152 refits planned in the five audit years were completed with an accumulated delay of 8,629 days. That constituted 74 per cent of the naval assets. Further, 66 refits were planned ab-initio in excess of the duration authorised under operational-cum-refit cycle, thereby resulting in an accumulated planned loss of 5,188 days in availability of the ships, it said.
