India’s CVC Issues Procurement Guidelines for Defense

Independent watchdog agencies are a reliable feature of advanced democracies. Their influence is usually indirect, but occasionally their reports or directives have a more immediate impact on military projects. India’s Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) has issued new directives on defence purchases which may seem somewhat familiar to observers in other countries, but may end up having an impact on several high-profile defense contracts.

As this DDINews report at Defense-Aerospace notes, The CVC has asked the Defence Ministry to avoid single-vendor situations unless very exceptional cicumstances exist, include standard contract terms in Request for Proposals, not deviate or dilute qualitative requirements after RFPs are issued, and require performance bonds and warranty bonds. That last requirement has appearently been something of an issue with Russian suppliers. Upcoming deals that could be affected include:

• The MRCA medium combat aircraft fighter deal, for 125-200 aircraft and $10-15 billion.
  
• The $500-700 million contract for new utility helicopters with high-altitude capability
  
• The long, long delayed purchase of new 155mm howitzers, worth up to $2 billion.