🗞️ Why in News Defence Minister Rajnath Singh released a strategic document titled RAKSHA at Kartavya Bhawan, New Delhi, on September 3, 2026. It sets out a ten-year roadmap for India’s defence partnerships, security cooperation and defence-industrial exports, and describes defence diplomacy as a core pillar of India’s foreign policy.
What the Document Says It Will Do
| Pillar | Content as reported |
|---|---|
| Strategic partnerships | Structured defence relationships with partner states over a decade-long horizon |
| Capacity building | Training, equipment and institutional support to partner militaries |
| Indigenous exports | Defence-industrial exports under the Make in India framework |
| Maritime security | The Indian Ocean Region, with India as a security provider rather than a claimant |
The document restates two self-descriptions India has used for over a decade: Net Security Provider and First Responder in the Indian Ocean Region, and commits India to being an anchor of stability and a rules-based order.
A note on the name. The document is titled RAKSHA. No expansion of the title was available in the reporting that could be verified, and none is offered here. The word itself means protection.
Why a Published Roadmap Is a Change, Even If Nothing Else Changes
Defence diplomacy in India has been real but undocumented. The instruments have existed for years: Defence Attachés posted to partner capitals, joint exercises across all three services, Lines of Credit that finance partner purchases of Indian equipment, training slots for foreign officers at the Indian Military Academy, the National Defence College and the Defence Services Staff College, and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief deployments that have repeatedly made India the first outside power to arrive in a regional emergency.
What has been missing is a document that states the objectives, so that the activity can be audited against them. A published roadmap converts a practice into a policy, and a policy can be evaluated. That is the modest but genuine claim to make for it.
The two things a roadmap does not by itself supply. It does not create a budget line, and it does not create an institutional owner. India’s Ministry of Defence has no dedicated defence-diplomacy division of the kind a foreign ministry maintains for a region. Without both, a decadal roadmap can remain aspirational, and saying so is the fair criticism rather than a cynical one.
Where This Sits in India’s Maritime Doctrine
| Year | Formulation |
|---|---|
| 2015 | SAGAR, Security and Growth for All in the Region, announced at Mauritius |
| March 2025 | MAHASAGAR, Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions, announced as the successor framing |
| 2026 | RAKSHA, extending the logic from the maritime neighbourhood to defence partnerships generally |
Why the succession matters for an answer. SAGAR was Indian Ocean specific. MAHASAGAR broadened the geography. RAKSHA broadens the instrument, from a regional maritime concept to defence diplomacy as a category. An answer that can place the three in sequence is describing an evolving doctrine rather than listing acronyms.
The Industrial Base Behind the Doctrine
Two days before the roadmap, on September 1, 2026, the Defence Minister conducted the annual performance review of all 16 Defence Public Sector Undertakings. The financial figures below were published by the Ministry of Defence on August 31, 2026, ahead of that review.
| Measure | 2025-26 |
|---|---|
| DPSU turnover | 1.29 lakh crore rupees |
| Cumulative profit after tax | 23,136 crore rupees, up 15.6 per cent on the 20,021 crore of 2024-25 |
| DPSU exports | up 151.2 per cent year on year |
Seven undertakings presented dividend cheques on the government’s equity: Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders, Bharat Electronics Limited, Bharat Dynamics Limited, Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers, BEML and MIDHANI.
The comparison that gives these numbers meaning. Total Indian defence production was 1.51 lakh crore rupees in 2024-25, of which DPSUs contributed 71.6 per cent. That single ratio is the most useful figure in any answer on defence indigenisation, because it says the ecosystem remains state-centred despite a decade of schemes aimed at widening it.
Reading the export number honestly. A 151.2 per cent increase off a small base is not evidence of a mature export industry. The analytical question is composition: whether exports are complete platforms and systems, which represent design capability, or components and sub-assemblies feeding foreign supply chains, which represent contract manufacturing. Both are worth having. They are not the same achievement, and a growth rate cannot distinguish them.
The Instruments a Candidate Should Be Able to Name
- Positive Indigenisation Lists, five notified for the armed services and five for the Defence Public Sector Undertakings, barring the import of listed items after specified dates.
- iDEX, Innovations for Defence Excellence, and ADITI, its scheme for critical and strategic technologies, both routes for start-ups into defence procurement.
- Defence Industrial Corridors in Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
- SRIJAN, the indigenisation portal listing items previously imported.
- The earmarking of 75 per cent of the capital procurement budget for domestic industry.
- The Defence Acquisition Procedure and its export-promotion provisions.
The Argument for a Mains Answer
For. Defence diplomacy has been reactive and, at times, personality-driven, moving with individual ministers and ambassadors. A decadal document with named pillars creates continuity across governments and gives partner states something to plan against. For smaller Indian Ocean states choosing between suppliers, predictability is itself a competitive advantage.
Against. A roadmap without money or an owner is a statement of intent. Worse, publishing objectives creates a measurable gap when they are not met, which can cost more credibility than it earns. The test will be whether the next defence budget carries an identifiable line for it.
The synthesis. Align RAKSHA with MAHASAGAR so that the Ministry of External Affairs and the Ministry of Defence are not running parallel neighbourhood policies; embed Defence Attachés in a career track rather than treating the posting as a terminal assignment; and tie the roadmap’s export pillar to the indigenous-content ratio inside exported platforms, not to their headline value.
UPSC Relevance
GS Paper 2. India and its neighbourhood; bilateral, regional and global groupings involving India; effect of policies of developed and developing countries on India’s interests.
GS Paper 3. Various security forces and agencies and their mandate; defence indigenisation; linkages between development and spread of extremism, insofar as capacity building is an instrument.
The Mains framing. Use this to argue that defence diplomacy is a distinct instrument of statecraft, sitting between hard power and development assistance, and that India’s comparative advantage in the Indian Ocean lies in being first, present and trained rather than in being largest.
A Mains question worth preparing. “Defence diplomacy has emerged as a distinct instrument of India’s foreign policy. Examine its principal instruments, assess India’s record in the Indian Ocean Region, and identify the institutional gaps. (250 words)”
Prelims focus. SAGAR 2015 and MAHASAGAR 2025; Net Security Provider and First Responder; the 16 DPSUs and their turnover; the DPSU share of defence production; Positive Indigenisation Lists; iDEX and ADITI; the Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu defence corridors.
📌 Facts Corner — Knowledgepedia
Prelims, statement-ready facts:
- RAKSHA, a ten-year defence diplomacy roadmap, was released on 3 September 2026 at Kartavya Bhawan, New Delhi.
- It was released by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.
- Its reported pillars are strategic partnerships, capacity building, indigenous exports under Make in India, and maritime security.
- It restates India’s self-description as Net Security Provider and First Responder in the Indian Ocean Region.
- SAGAR, Security and Growth for All in the Region, was announced in 2015; MAHASAGAR, Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions, in March 2025.
- The annual review of all 16 Defence Public Sector Undertakings was held on 1 September 2026.
- DPSU turnover in 2025-26 was 1.29 lakh crore rupees and profit after tax 23,136 crore rupees, up 15.6 per cent on the 20,021 crore of 2024-25.
- DPSU exports rose 151.2 per cent in 2025-26 over the previous financial year.
- Of about 1.8 lakh crore rupees of Indian defence production in 2025-26, DPSUs contributed 1.29 lakh crore.
- Seven DPSUs presented dividend cheques totalling 3,951 crore rupees.
- Seven DPSUs presented dividends: HAL, Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders, BEL, Bharat Dynamics, GRSE, BEML and MIDHANI.
- Total Indian defence production in 2024-25 was 1.51 lakh crore rupees, of which DPSUs contributed 71.6 per cent.
- Five Positive Indigenisation Lists have been notified for the services and five for the DPSUs.
- iDEX is Innovations for Defence Excellence; ADITI is its scheme for critical and strategic technologies.
- Defence Industrial Corridors are located in Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
- 75 per cent of the capital procurement budget is earmarked for domestic industry.
Prelims, the traps:
- A 151.2 per cent export increase is a growth rate off a small base and says nothing about whether exports are platforms or components.
- The DPSU share of 71.6 per cent of defence production is the figure that shows the ecosystem is still state-centred, despite the private-sector schemes.
- SAGAR, MAHASAGAR and RAKSHA are successive and distinct: regional maritime concept, wider geography, then defence diplomacy as a category.
Mains, arguments and keywords:
- Frame: a published roadmap converts a practice into an auditable policy, which is worth something even before any new capability is added.
- Keywords: net security provider, first responder, capacity building, strategic autonomy, indigenous content ratio.
- The gap: no dedicated budget line and no institutional owner inside the Ministry of Defence for defence diplomacy.
- The metric that matters for exports is composition and indigenous content, not headline value or growth rate.
- Way forward: align RAKSHA with MAHASAGAR so MEA and MoD do not run parallel policies; make Defence Attaché postings a career track.
Interview, be ready for:
- Probe: “What does India actually offer a small Indian Ocean state?” Name arrival time, training slots and lines of credit before naming platforms.
- Probe: “Are defence exports up 151 per cent good news?” Ask what is being exported; distinguish design capability from contract manufacturing.
Sources: Business Standard, Ministry of Defence
Source: A Decade on Paper: India Publishes RAKSHA, Its First Long-Range Defence Diplomacy Roadmap — Ujiyari.com | Free UPSC & State PCS Current Affairs
