After his election win, Prime Minister Narendra Modi doubled down on the modernisation of the Indian Armed Forces. Indian political analyst Amrita Dhillon has explained Modi's focus on the military build-up, the defence minister's statement on “no first use” of nuclear weapons, and Russia's competitive advantages as India's top arms supplier.

Axar.az reports citing Over the past few months, the Indian leadership has touched upon a number of defence issues including: first, the establishment of the Defence Space Agency (DSA) in April and the Defence Space Research Organisation (DSRO) in June, aimed at bolstering India’s space warfare capabilities; second, the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) reform; third, the decision to spend $130 billion to accelerate the modernisation of the country's military forces, to name just a few.

On 16 August, Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh dropped the hint that India’s “no first nuclear weapons use” doctrine is open for change in the future. "India has strictly adhered to the [‘No First Use’] doctrine. What happens in future depends on the circumstances", he tweeted. What became the trigger for this abrupt statement, in your opinion? What message did Singh's statement send and who is the major addressee?

The Indian Armed forces are in a dire need of modernisation, especially, when you are dealing with a neighbour who's not normal and uses cross-border terrorism as a diplomatic tool. India is looking into all left, right and centre for the scopes of modernisation, either it is in the field of conventional war weapons or the next generation cyber warfare.