Indian gov't increases defense budget by 7.81 pct

NEW DELHI, Feb. 1 (Xinhua) -- The Indian government on Thursday announced the defense budget of this fiscal year at 2,95,511 crore rupees (46.1 billion U.S. dollars, increasing 7.81 percent from last year's 2,74,114 crore rupees (42.8 billion U.S. dollars).

The defence budget amounts to 12.1 percent of the total budget of the country, the government said.

Indian Finance Minister Aru Jaitley said on Thursday that the country would ensure adequate budgetary support to the defence sector, as it's the priority of the government agenda.

"A lot of emphasis has been given to modernizing and enhancing the operational capability of the defense forces over the last three and a half years," Jaitley said while presenting the country's budget 2018-19 at the parliament.

In the presentation, he proposed setting up two defence industrial production corridors.

"A number of initiatives have been taken to develop and nurture the intrinsic defense production capability to make the nation self-reliant for meeting our defence needs," Jaitley said. Enditem