Indian Army will now get 50,000 bullet-proof vests for which it had to sign an "emergency" procurement contract worth Rs 140 crores. "The jackets will be delivered from August onwards. All the jackets are to be delivered by January 2017," a defence ministry source said.
The Army's existing bulky bullet-proof vests - with poor protection - are near the end of their operational life. Given the huge shortage of such vests in the 1.18-million strong Army - defence minister Manohar Parrikar approved this "interim emergency acquisition" through the "revenue route" soon after he took over minister in November 2014.
An earlier tender for the "capital procurement" of 1.86 lakh modular jackets was scrapped in October 2015 because the samples offered by six vendors "failed" to clear field trials. Another 1.67 lakh vests are to be supplied by 2017.
The Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) has now come up with a prototype bullet-proof jacket, as per the newer technical specifications, using different "state-of-the-art ballistic materials". This under-development prototype aims to protect against AK-47s and self-loading rifle bullets.
"The prototype has successfully undergone stage-1 and 2 trials. It will be a contender in the fresh capital procurement case being initiated again for the first lot of 1.86 lakh jackets," said a source.
Source- Indiatimes/TOI
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