India Eyes $2 Bn Drone Order in Biggest Military Purchase Yet

India plans to place its largest-ever military drone order, with purchases from domestic manufacturers expected to go beyond $2 billion this year, revealed a Reuters report, as the demand accelerates following global and regional tension.

The plans are in advanced stages with deliveries expected over 18 to 24 months, as previous orders had been valued at around 30 billion for tactical-class drones, said Smit Shah, President of Drone Federation of India (DFI).

Shah told Reuters that procurement is likely to move through a fast-track route, reflecting the urgency of the situation. "In the next phase, tactical drone procurements in India may exceed 200 billion rupees, or more than $2 billion," said Shah.

The push follows India's confrontation with Pakistan last year in May, in which both countries deployed a large scale of unmanned aerial vehicles for the first time. The episode highlighted the strategic value that low-cost drones have.

"Drones are force multipliers on the modern battlefields," said Ramesh Chandra Padhi of IG Defence, a builder of unmanned aerial and short-range missiles. The ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and West Asia have reinforced that lesson globally, boosting the demand and cost of drones.

In March, the defence ministry showed greenlight to a broader capital allocation of approximately 2.38 trillion rupees to buy transport aircraft, missile systems and armed drones, though the breakdown by category was not disclosed.

India's Drone Industry Takes Flight

India has ramped up its efforts to streamline its typical slow defence procurement in recent years. Focusing on emergency procurement powers and swifter efforts under the Defence Acquisition Procedure, at the same time, it has started prioritising domestic manufacturing.

It has more than 600 firms engaged in drone manufacturing and component supply, with more than 100 defence application-oriented firms. The government has also expanded schemes such as Innovation for Defence Excellence (iDEX) to fund prototypes and enable smaller firms to win initial orders and up scale production.

At Present, the industry includes large-scale players such as Adani Group, Larsen & Toubro and Tata Advanced Systems alongside new generation of defence-focused startups including ideaForge, Newspace Research and Asteria Aerospace, working across reconnaissance, logictics, loitering munition, precision strike and critical component systems.

The changes are reshaping India's drone industry, long doominated by small players, as better order visibility and policy support unlock funding and partnership, Shah added.