Defence IT Consultative Committee meets

New Delhi, Sep 22: Seeking to bridge the IT gap between the Armed Forces, the academia and the industry, the tri-Services headquarters have organised a Defence Information Technology Consultative meeting here to synergise ongoing efforts in the fast developing field.

The first meeting of the Defence Information Technology Consultative Committee (DITCC) -- inaugurated by Minister of State for Defence MM Pallam Raju -- aims at facilitating joint interaction between the Armed Forces, the academia, Industry and Government officials in the area of Information Technology.

The Headquarter Integrated Defence Staff (IDS) -- a tri-Services organisation -- has been tasked to synergise the efforts put in individually by the three arms so as to harness the maximum potential and achieve a more integrated approach.

According to an official spokesperson, the quantum jump in IT and its entry into every discipline of science and technology has had a strong influence upon the future war-fighting capability of a nation state. With India emerging as a world leader in this technology, it was all the more pertinent to leverage this strength to enhance the country's defence capability, the spokesperson pointed out.

The three services have been independently developing their capability to augment their operational, logistic, administrative and management functions. This developmental process was further expected to grow exponentially necessitating phenomenal budget support.

These efforts, however, need to be synergised for effective capability-building and optimum utilisation of resources taking benefit of the commonality among the three forces, the Defence Ministry and its other departments.

It has been noted that in order to achieve synergy among the three Services and to derive maximum benefits from the technology, it was imperative that the correct advice and direction be provided to the conceived plans.

Towards this end, the Defence Ministry had decided to formulate a Defence IT Consultative Committee comprising members from the three Services, the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the Industry and the Academia under the Chairmanship of the Chief of Integrated Staff Committee (CISC), HQ IDS.

DITCC -- being advisory in nature -- will help the Armed Forces in synchronising the efforts with the rapidly changing Information and Communication Technologies.

UNI