Synergising Quality Assurance for Speedy Defence Procurement and Ensuring Quality

The Directorate General of Quality Assurance (DGQA) is the organisation that is responsible for ensuring the quality of a wide range of military hardware at the time of their procurement. This is a very old organisation and has evolved over a period of time to meet the aspirations of its customers. However, since the introduction of Defence Procurement Procedure it has invited lot of criticism from its users due to the delays caused in procurements and attributable to Quality Assurance (QA), as also the introduction of sub-standard equipment in service. This monograph analyses the factors that are causing the delays as also those limiting the quality of the QA of military hardware being procured. It also gives certain implementable solutions in the form of minor re-engineering of the organisation and the business processes of DGQA. Due care has been taken to ensure that the existing organisation and QA procedures are not tampered with. It also lays down a roadmap to address the greatest concern of the parent procuring directorates regarding rejection of vendors based on quality of their product leading to single vendor/ no vendor cases. Future challenges that the DGQA is likely to face in view of a more determined approach to establish a robust indigenous defence industry, have also been enumerated in this monograph.

About the Author

Mahendra Prasad has been working with the Engineering Support Branch of the Indian Army for last 25 years. He is an alumnus of St. Stephen's College Delhi, Indian Military Academy Dehradun and IIT, Delhi. He holds an M Tech degree in Industrial Engineering and a Basic License in Jet Engines from DGCA. He has held a Grade -1 appointment at Military College of Electronics and Mechanical Engineering, Secunderabad and done tenure with DGQA from February 2009 to September 2011. The officer was a Research Fellow at Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) from 26 September 2011 to 25 September 2013. He is presently teaching aeronautical engineering at Military College of Electronics and Mechanical Engineering, Secunderabad.

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