*NEW DELHI: Indian *Army top officer has made startling revelations in theParliament revealing that two third of the Indian Army equipment isobsolete.

Indian Army vice chief told parliament’s standing committee that 68 percent of the Indian Army is vintage era and the army’s budget isn’t enoughto pay for even existing projects.

Army’s Vice Chief Lt Gen Sarath Chand has told the panel of lawmakers thatthe Army had identified 25 projects for Make in India as part of itsmodernisation plan but many of these may have to be scrapped because “thereis not adequate Budget to support this”.

“As far as we are concerned, the state today is 68 per cent of ourequipment is in the vintage category, with just about 24 per cent in thecurrent, and eight per cent in the state of the art category,” he said.

Army officers say the proportion of equipment that can be classified asvintage should not exceed one-third.

“The Budget of 2018-19 has dashed our hopes and most of what had beenachieved has actually received a little set back,” the top Army officertold the panel.

In this year’s budget, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley earmarked Rs 21,338crore for the army’s modernisation. The Army had asked for 37,000 crore.

The Army officer said this allocation was insufficient to cater forcommitted payment of Rs 29,000 crore on 125 on-going schemes and wouldhardly leave any funds for new schemes.

One of the casualties could be the Future Ready Combat Vehicles that thearmy had been hoping would form the base of its main battle tanks andreplace the existing tanks such as the T-72 tanks that have been servicesince the 1980s.

But the funds shortage could delay such plans by a few years. “I am notsure what is going to be their future,” Vice Chief Lieutenant GeneralSarath Chand told the committee.

The Army told the parliamentary committee that “the possibility oftwo-front war is a reality” and “it is important that… we pay attentionto our modernisation and filling up our deficiencies”.