New Delhi: The Comptroller and Auditor General of India has flagged that the replacement of existing artillery guns with state-of-the-art guns has been progressing at a "slow pace" for over last two decades. The Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General on Union Government (Defence Services) - Army and Ordnance Factories was presented in the Parliament on Monday.

"C&AG's Report No. 6 of 2023, Union Government (Defence Services) - Army and Ordnance Factories for the year ended March 2020 was laid on the table of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha," the audit body said in a statement.

This report contains the results of audit of the transactions for the year ended March 2020 pertaining to the Department of Defence, the Indian Army, the Inter-Services Organisations such as Military Engineer Services (MES), Canteen Stores Department (CSD), etc., the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and the Ordnance Factories under the Ministry of Defence, it said.

The CAG has also shared about its findings on the acquisition of artillery gun system among other areas.

"The replacement of the existing artillery guns with state-of-the-art guns has been progressing at a slow pace for over the last two decades.

"Of the six proposals for acquisition/upgradation of artillery guns, only three culminated into contracts constituting 17 per cent out of the total numbers of artillery guns planned for acquisition. The acquisition process suffered from delays at various stages of procurement," the statement said.

Requests for Proposal (RFP) were issued, retracted, and again issued due to "poor response/non-compliance to the qualitative requirements" by the vendors, it said.

Further, the process of the field evaluation was not standardised with respect to the time period involved, it said.

The delays underscore the need for the ministry/Army headquarters to ensure that qualitative requirements for capital acquisition of weapon systems are formulated on realistic basis by predicating the entire process on a rigorous technology scan, and also devising a mechanism for speedy field/staff evaluations, the statement said.

Among other findings, it said the audit of 13 out of 62 Cantonment Boards (CBs) in the country revealed "several lacunae" in the civic amenities provided by the boards to their residents, according to the statement by the CAG.

It said only one CB had a functional sewage treatment plant and five CBs had solid waste processing plants for scientific disposal of solid waste.

Eleven CBs were inadequately equipped to provide medical services to their residents, it said.

Two CBs were heavily dependent on grants-in-aid. Allocation against the demands of funds for creation of capital assets was meagre in the selected CBs, it said.

Further, an amount of Rs 2461.16 crore was outstanding against the Defence Services and other central/state government departments on account of municipal taxes and service charges raised by these CBs, the statement said.

Besides, construction of three twin Igloos, four explosive store houses and allied works were taken up in May 2003. However, due to ambiguity in contract documents leading to dispute (May 2007) with the contractor, construction of the assets could only be completed in December 2013, it said.

"Further, despite an expenditure Rs 4.01 crore, the Igloos were also not built to the desired concrete specifications and the net explosive content of Igloos was downgraded.

"Moreover, only one Igloo was put to use in June 2022, which also suffered from profuse leakage and seepage in monsoon. Thus the intended benefits of constructing Igloos for storage of ammunition could not be derived," it observed in the statement.

Snow and Avalanche Establishment (SASE) under the aegis of DRDO is responsible to provide avalanche forecasting support to the services including advice on avalanche control measures.

"Although SASE was aware (2017) of the need to increase the number of Manual Observatories (MO)/Automatic Weather Stations (AWS) to improve forecasting accuracy, a comprehensive plan of action for the purpose was yet to be finalised," it flagged.

The sanction of a new Ordnance Factory at Korwa was accorded (October 2007) by the Ministry of Defence for manufacture of two types of carbines viz. Close Quarter Battle (CQB) carbines through import with Transfer of Technology (ToT) and of Protective carbines through indigenous production.

"However, neither of the carbines could be developed (March 2022) as per Army's specification even after a lapse of 14 years of the project sanction," it said.

"Ordnance Factory Khamaria (OFK) was unable to successfully test the indigenously developed Arming Device of an ammunition even after a lapse of 17 years of the Transfer of Technology (ToT) contract with the OEM due to inordinate delay of more than 10 years in procurement of the Flight Data Recorder.

"Despite lack of prescribed testing infrastructure, OFK injudiciously procured bulk quantity of raw material and manufactured bulk quantity of Arming Devices which resulted in idle investment of Rs 77.11 crore," the statement said.

Canteen Stores Department Head Office (CSD HO) processes bills for payment to the suppliers through an outdated software programme, it said.

The continued use of the outdated software, coupled with inadequate controls enabled multiple entries of the same bills in the system resulting in "several instances of double payments" to suppliers, it said.