SRIJAN Defence Indigenisation Portal

SRIJAN, an acronym rendered in Hindi to mean "creation," is a defence indigenisation portal launched by the Department of Defence Production (DDP) under India's Ministry of Defence on 14 August 2020. Its creation followed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's May 2020 Atmanirbhar Bharat (Self-Reliant India) announcement and the broader policy push to reduce India's standing as one of the world's largest arms importers. The portal operationalises objectives set out in the Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020 and the Defence Production and Export Promotion Policy (DPEPP) 2020, which targeted a defence manufacturing turnover of ₹1.75 lakh crore by 2025 and a sharp rise in domestic value addition. SRIJAN functions as a one-stop digital marketplace where Defence Public Sector Undertakings (DPSUs), the Ordnance Factory Board (later the seven new Defence PSUs created in October 2021), and the armed services display items they have historically imported and invite Indian vendors to develop indigenous substitutes.

The procedural mechanics centre on a structured matchmaking workflow between buyers and prospective domestic suppliers. A DPSU or service headquarters uploads onto the portal the technical specifications, drawings (where releasable), annual procurement quantity, and import value of a component, subsystem, or raw material it wishes to localise. Indian companies—including Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and start-ups—register on the portal, browse the displayed items, and express interest in those they can manufacture. The sponsoring agency then evaluates the vendor's capability, may share further design data under non-disclosure terms, and proceeds toward development orders, trials, and eventual induction. The portal thereby compresses the discovery phase that previously left small firms unaware of which import lines were open for substitution.

The portal complements the parallel instrument of the Positive Indigenisation Lists (PILs), also styled "negative import lists." Beginning in August 2020, the Department of Military Affairs issued successive lists of major platforms and weapon systems—aircraft, artillery guns, radars, ammunition—barred from import after staggered embargo dates. The Department of Defence Production issued separate lists covering thousands of line-replaceable units, subsystems, and components produced by the DPSUs. Items appearing on these lists are routed through SRIJAN so that domestic vendors can be matched against them. By design the portal converts a policy prohibition on imports into an actionable commercial pipeline rather than leaving it as a paper restriction.

By the years following launch, the Ministry of Defence reported that SRIJAN hosted tens of thousands of items uploaded by DPSUs and that a substantial share had been picked up for indigenisation by registered vendors. Capitals and institutions involved include the DDP in New Delhi, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) in Bengaluru, Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) in Hyderabad, and the successor entities of the dissolved Ordnance Factory Board such as Munitions India Limited. The DPEPP, the annual "indigenisation" awards conferred by the Ministry, and the SRIJAN portal together form the administrative architecture through which the Atmanirbhar Bharat defence agenda is monitored, with figures cited in successive editions of the Ministry's annual report and in Parliamentary replies by the Raksha Mantri.

SRIJAN must be distinguished from several adjacent mechanisms. It is not a procurement tender system: actual contracting still proceeds under the Defence Acquisition Procedure 2020 and the General Financial Rules. Nor should it be conflated with iDEX (Innovations for Defence Excellence), launched in 2018, which funds technology innovation by start-ups through Defence Innovation Organisation challenges and grants; SRIJAN targets substitution of already-defined imported items rather than novel research. It is also separate from the Make I, Make II, and Strategic Partnership categories of capital acquisition, and from the offsets policy, which obliges foreign vendors to source a percentage of contract value domestically. SRIJAN's distinctive contribution is information transparency at the component level.

Controversies and limitations attend the portal's record. Critics note that listing an item is not equivalent to successful indigenisation, and that the gap between items "uploaded" and items actually fielded in service can be wide, owing to qualification testing, intellectual-property constraints on foreign-origin designs, and quantity uncertainty that deters MSME investment. Concerns persist that "indigenisation" sometimes amounts to assembly of imported subcomponents rather than genuine domestic value addition, a critique levelled at several flagship programmes. Subsequent measures—the creation of the seventh and later editions of the positive indigenisation lists, dedicated MSME outreach, and the 2024 emphasis on defence exports crossing the ₹21,000 crore mark—reflect official efforts to convert portal listings into demonstrable capability and export competitiveness.

For the working practitioner—whether a UPSC General Studies Paper III aspirant, a defence-desk analyst, or a procurement officer—SRIJAN exemplifies how an industrial-policy objective is rendered into routine administrative practice. It is most usefully understood as one node in a larger ecosystem comprising the PILs, DPEPP 2020, DAP 2020, iDEX, and the Defence Corridors in Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Examiners and analysts should be able to situate the portal against India's persistent import dependence on Russia, the United States, France, and Israel, and to evaluate critically whether digital matchmaking has materially shifted the balance between import substitution and genuine technological self-reliance in the defence sector.