Military Intelligence paid hundreds of crores of rupees
for outdated software, documents obtained by “The Hindu” show
The Indian Army's
imagery interpretation capabilities, critical to providing information on the
locations of enemy troops and their military assets, have been compromised by
flawed contracts placed with a company that has failed to provide critical
software upgrades, an investigation by The Hindu has found.
Documents obtained by The Hindu from the Ministry
of Defence show that the firm responsible for supplying and integrating
software used in critical image intelligence analysis was relieved of its
responsibility to provide free upgrades in 2008 — and is now on the verge of
receiving a Rs.165-crore contract for the supply of software it may no longer have
licensing rights for.
MI17 — the super-secret
military intelligence department that analyses data provided by India's spy
satellites — relies on software provided by global software giants Intergraph,
Oracle, and Bentley.
Rolta, an
Indian company, supplied photogrammetry and geographical information system
software licensed from these firms to the Army in 1996, integrating them into a
single package to meet MI17's specific needs. From then to 2008, things went
well — when a new contract for 14 photogrammetry and geographical information
system packages came up to be signed.
The
earlier contract bound Rolta to provide software “updates and upgrades” free of
cost, as part of a maintenance contract. In 2008, though, the phrasing was
changed to just “updates”— freeing Rolta of the obligation to provide the most
recent software released by the original equipment manufacturer.
Rolta was paid Rs.506.45 crore for equipment purchased
between 1998 and 2008. In addition, it received annual maintenance contracts for
equipment purchased during this period; as of December 2008, their cumulative
value was Rs. 40.66 crore per annum.
But by early this year, highly-placed military sources
said, MI17's image-processing speeds had fallen to just a seventh of those
being obtained by the National Technical Research Organisation, which also
analyses the same data using similar software with the latest upgrades,
Intergraph-Erdas.
Dubious
negotiations
The
records of the contract negotiation committee, or CNC, show a series of
questionable decisions led to this outcome. In the fourth meeting of the CNC,
one member noted that an odd change had been made to the name of the software
being supplied to MI17: “the vendor,” he observed, “had added [the] company
name ‘Rolta' in all the software being provided by him.” The change of name
implied that the equipment being supplied was not the same as was purchased in
1996, which would have necessitated fresh acquisition procedures to be
initiated.
Atul
Tayal, Rolta's representative, responded in the fifth meeting of the CNC that
only the brand name was changing — not the equipment itself. During Rolta's
“association with the Indian Armed Forces over more than one decade,” he said,
“the company had developed a number of customised modules specifically designed
to address the needs of the Military Intelligence Directorate.”
“These
customised modules,” he wrote, “are integrated with the basic equipment and
supplied to the user. Due to this the company has decided to supply these
equipments [sic.] under the brand name of Rolta India Limited after the
necessary approval of M/S Intergraph, USA
The CNC
guarded its flanks, the minutes of its fourth meeting show, with its chairman
insisting that “a certificate from the vendor be obtained certifying that
software offered in the present and previous contract are the same.” It was
further directed, the minutes record, “that adequate provisions will be made in
the contract to confirm the fact at PDI [pre-delivery inspection] and ATP
[acceptance test procedures] stage.”
In a
September 2010 letter, Rolta certified it would “have full guarantee and
warranty from Intergraph Corporation with respect to the goods sourced from
them for IIT [imagery interpretation team] equipment under replacement.” The
certificate was signed by Brigadier Anjum Shahab, the Regional Director of
Defence Sales for Rolta – and the same individual who, as Deputy Director
General of Military Intelligence in 2008, served on the controversial CNC.
The
actual “full guarantee and warranty” from Intergraph was never provided, for
the simple reason that the 2008 contract did not call on Rolta to hand it over.
From other documents, however, it seems apparent that no such guarantee
actually exists. In a letter to the Defence Secretary, written on July 8, 2011,
Intergraph said it had “reliably learnt from a number of Ministry of Defence
officers that the Indian Army may have been supplied Intergraph GIS software
under a different name.”
It
asserted that Intergraph had at no point authorised anyone “to customise any of
the products and/or to sell the Products under the name and/or branding of the
Distributor or any other company.” Put simply, that meant Rolta had no rights
to license Intergraph software to the Army — and that Intergraph would not,
therefore, supply the periodic upgrades that came with the package.
Nonetheless, the Indian Army is now firming up plans to
purchase another Rs.165 crore worth of equipment from Rolta. MI17
sources said no fresh procurement procedure will have to be carried out because
the vendor continues to be Rolta — even though its elements are likely to be
assembled from modules supplied by a Canada-based software company, PCI
Geomatics.
More than
half the cost of the new order, sources said, is made up of software giving
capabilities that MI17 would have had anyway, if upgrades had been obtained
since 2008. Documents available with The Hindu also reveal that the
Planning Officer of the Directorate of Planning and Coordination, Department of
Defence Procurement, had written a letter on November 17, 2009, recommending
that fresh “equipment may be procured through competitive bidding.”
Indian Army officials declined to discuss the contract
on record, or to discuss specifics. However, a high military official who
briefed The Hindu on condition of anonymity said that while he was aware
of complaints about Rolta, they were “being made to malign the operational
efficiency of the Army.” He noted that Rolta was not obligated to give
upgrades, but did not explain why the 2008 contract, and subsequent ones, had
relieved it of its earlier obligation to provide them. For its part, Rolta also
pointed out that it had met its contractual obligations. In an e-mail to The
Hindu, Rolta said it had “provided all deliverables it has been contracted
to under various agreements with MoD.” In response to a question on whether
they had permission to supply Intergraph software, Rolta said the equipment it
had supplied was delivered “in line with their respective end-user licences.”
Mr. Atul Tayal told The Hindu that the allegations “are absolutely
baseless and seem to have been made with mala fide and motivated”.
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