Mumbai, June 5: Indian Army has decided to cut down 50 per cent of supplies from state-run ordnance factories. According to a report in The Economic Times, the move aims at ensuring adequate budget for procuring ammunition for short intense wars. The move would reportedly mean that the soldiers would be forced to spend their own money to buy uniforms and other clothes.

The report says that the ordnance factories' supply to the Indian Army will be brought down from 94 to 50 per cent due to insufficient funds for emergency procurement of ammunition and spares as the Centre has not provided these funds. This will affect the supplies of combat dress, shoes, belts etc to soldiers.

As per the report, with the Centre not providing funds that amount to thousands of crores for building a stock of emergency weapons, the Army has been forced to make arrangements for it from its own budget.

The report quotes an official as saying that about Rs 5,000 crore has been spent on emergency procurement and another Rs 6,739.83 crore has to be paid. The project with the 10(I) order now costs about Rs 21,739.83 crore, says the report. The official said that in March, the Army had made an initial cut in supplies from ordnance factories.

The Army is reportedly working on three projects - emergency procurement, 10(I) order and Make in India - and needs funds for these.

Meanwhile, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday addressed the media on Defence expenditure and said that there was no cash crunch. "There is no shortage of Defence ammunition today. Allegations of scam in the Rafael deal are baseless," she added.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 05, 2018 02:07 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).