Soon after he took charge as Union home minister in 2008, P. Chidambaram cleared a long-awaited proposal to procure 32,766 telescopic night vision devices (NVDs) for the paramilitary forces. Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), a prestigious public sector undertaking, bagged the contract.
BEL started supplying the NVDs in September 2010. Till March 2011, it supplied 5,000 NVDs, of which 2,000 were tested.
The story began in December 2006, when the home ministry put out a tender for NVDs. The tender stated that the devices were to be compatible with INSAS rifles and light machine guns (LMG) used by the paramilitary forces.
On February 23, 2009, Dinesh Batra, senior deputy general manager, BEL, wrote to R.S. Sharma, then director of procurement, home ministry, that it could supply the required device.
On June 23, 2009, a trial was conducted at the Border Security Force range in Gurgaon. The trial team consisted of officers of the BSF, Indo-Tibetan Border Police, National Security Guard and Central Reserve Police Force.
Surprisingly, despite the shortcomings, no second trial or field trial was conducted.
Katoch said the four important performance parameters of an NVD are its sound-noise ratio (SNR), resolution, modular transfer function and lifetime (see box).
On January 7, 2010, S. Chattopadhyaya, inspector-general, BSF, issued a proprietary article certificate in favour of BEL stating that no other Indian firm manufactured passive night vision telescopic sights.
Documents accessed by THE WEEK reveal that BEL did not manufacture the NVDs.The officer also told THE WEEK that when the issue of the unmarked II tubes was raised, BEL temporarily stopped supply.According to reliable sources, high on the suspicion list is R.S. Sharma, former director (procurement), home ministry (see box).
The lack of NVDs was felt acutely after the Maoist attack in Dantewada on April 6, 2010, which claimed the lives of 76 CRPF personnel.With the Indian market for NVDs projected at $1 billion, foreign companies like Prizmatech are bullish onIndia.
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