India stands at a defining moment in its technological and strategic journey. The ongoing reforms within the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) are not merely another bureaucratic restructuring. They represent perhaps the most consequential institutional reform in India's defence innovation ecosystem - R&D.
If executed with conviction, they could determine whether India becomes a genuine technology power or continues to remain dependent on others for critical military capabilities.
According to government sources, the Prime Minister's Office has directed that the restructuring of DRDO be completed by 2026. The objective is ambitious: transform DRDO into a leaner, more efficient, and globally competitive research organisation, capable of delivering next-generation military technologies.
The urgency is welcome. But structural reforms alone will not solve India's defence innovation challenge. The deeper questions concern talent, resources, institutional culture, and national priorities.
R&D in national security must never be viewed as a cost centre. It is a strategic investment that safeguards sovereignty. Every breakthrough in propulsion, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies, semiconductors, or autonomous systems translates directly into military capability and geopolitical leverage. For a rising power aspiring to become a developed nation by 2047, under-investing in defence R&D is not merely poor budgeting, but a strategic mistake.
The DRDO's achievements deserve recognition before criticism. Its record in missiles and strategic systems is remarkable by any global standard. The organisation has delivered the Agni to Akash and Nag, cruise missile BrahMos in partnership with Russia, and is now at work on complex air defence systems like Project Kusha.
Its contributions to radar systems, electronic warfare, secure communications, sensors, and naval technologies have substantially strengthened India's armed forces. Working alongside defence public sector undertakings, the DRDO has enabled indigenous warship construction and advanced combat systems that were once considered beyond India's technological reach.
These successes demonstrate that India can build world-class defence technologies when policy, scientific leadership, and political commitment converge.
Yet, modern warfare is evolving much faster than traditional research institutions. The battlefields of today have fundamentally altered military thinking. Autonomous systems, unmanned platforms, AI, drones, electronic warfare and cyber capabilities, and advanced propulsion are becoming the decisive technologies of future conflicts.
What To Do In Military R&D
It is precisely in several of these areas where India continues to lag.
The Kaveri jet engine programme remains unfinished after decades. Indigenous propulsion technologies still trail global leaders. Autonomous and unmanned systems require much deeper investments than India currently makes. The country also lacks commercial-scale semiconductor fabrication facilities, forcing dependence on imported chips that power radars, avionics, communication systems, and electronic warfare equipment. These technological vulnerabilities cannot simply be addressed by reorganising laboratories.
Managing DRDO, therefore, is not merely about restructuring departments. It is about rethinking how India conducts strategic research itself.
Three fundamental questions deserve honest answers.
1. Is DRDO Attracting Country's Finest Talent?
The answer is uncomfortable: not consistently.
Every year, India's best engineering graduates leave for universities, laboratories, and technology companies across the United States, Europe, and other global institutions. Thousands of Indian-origin scientists today contribute to cutting-edge research at organisations such as DARPA, NASA, leading semiconductor companies, AI laboratories, and global tech firms. Their work defines tomorrow's technologies - but rarely under the Indian flag.
If India can produce world-class scientists, why cannot its premier defence laboratory attract and retain them?
2. Does DRDO Possess Adequate Resources?
Again, only partially.
DRDO operates 52 laboratories across multiple technology domains. Yet the existence of laboratories does not automatically translate into cutting-edge innovation. Scientific excellence depends upon concentration of talent, sustained funding, modern infrastructure, international collaboration, but with ownership.
Its budget tells the story.
For FY 2026-27, the DRDO has been allocated approximately Rs 29,100 crore, or roughly USD 3.5 billion. While this represents a significant national commitment, it remains modest when compared with global competitors.
The United States Department of Defence spends well over USD 100 billion annually on research, development, testing, and evaluation. China's defence R&D expenditure is estimated at around USD 44 billion every year. Both countries allocate roughly 12-15% of their defence expenditure to R&D and technological development. India's allocation remains closer to 5-6 per cent, leaving a substantial capability gap.
Recognising these limitations, the government has wisely opened nearly one-fourth of the defence R&D budget to private industry, startups, and academia. This is an important beginning.
However, genuine innovation ecosystems cannot be built through outsourcing alone. They require seamless integration between government laboratories, universities, industry, and venture capital - something that countries like the United States and Israel have perfected over decades. For example, more than 430 multinational R&D centres operate in Israel, and we all buy their technologies.
3. Remuneration
Scientific talent today competes in a global marketplace. Compensation is not the sole motivation for researchers, but it certainly matters. Policymakers must ask an uncomfortable question: has India seriously debated what globally competitive remuneration looks like for scientists working on critical technologies?
International laboratories offer vastly superior research facilities, greater autonomy, stronger peer networks, and significantly better compensation.
If India wants the best minds to remain - or even persuade Indian-origin scientists abroad to return - it must compete globally rather than administratively.
DRDO should be empowered to recruit globally, collaborate internationally where national interests permit, offer flexible compensation for exceptional researchers, and create mission-oriented teams.
Kalam's Mould Model
Pride is still worth millions, and to build that, the organisation must offer mission, autonomy, recognition, and accountable leadership. What DRDO needs is a cadre of leaders in the Kalam mould, scientifically credible, institution-building, turning individuals into high-performance teams.
The objective should not merely be to reform DRDO but to transform it into India's equivalent of a strategic innovation ecosystem - combining the agility of DARPA, the scientific excellence of leading research universities, and the industrial depth of advanced defence economies.
Equally important is India's university ecosystem.
Defence innovation must go beyond government laboratories. Sadly, universities have failed in applied research. Unfortunately, barring a handful of institutions, much of Indian higher education remains disconnected from frontier technological development.
This must change.
Every major DRDO mission should be institutionally linked with universities, IITs, IISc, startups, and private laboratories. Long-term grants, doctoral fellowships, defence innovation clusters, and tech incubators should become part of DRDO's core mandate rather than peripheral initiatives.
A nation of India's scale cannot depend on one organisation alone to produce every strategic technology.
A Big Or Smaller DRDO? A Pointless Question
The ongoing reforms thus present a historic opportunity. The question is not whether DRDO should become smaller or larger.
The real question is whether India is prepared to build an entirely new model of defence innovation - one that rewards excellence, embraces global standards, attracts the best minds, and concentrates resources on technologies that will define future wars.
For too long, India has measured self-reliance by counting platforms produced. The next phase of Atmanirbhar Bharat must instead be measured by the technologies invented.
The reforms must, therefore, move beyond organisational charts and laboratory consolidation. They must invest in people, ideas, and institutions.
Missiles alone will not secure India's technological future. Leadership in propulsion, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, semiconductors, autonomous systems, and advanced materials will.
What DRDO Must Do Within
DRDO's reform agenda must go beyond structure and manpower; it must embed world-class project management as a daily operating norm. The organisation already has procedural documents, but unless these are enforced uniformly across projects, they remain paperwork rather than capability. For strategic R&D, process discipline is not administrative overhead; it is what turns scientific ambition into deliverable systems.
Building such an ecosystem will demand political courage, investment, and institutional flexibility. It will also require abandoning outdated bureaucratic practices in favour of scientific excellence and merit.
(The author is a national security expert, defence editor, and the founder of the military think tank Strategic Insights)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
