JOIN USWith an unofficial probe being ordered into the contractual issues of Operation Samvahak, the Army’s sensitive Command and Information Decision Support System (CIDSS) – a network based software project – gaps are evident in the strategic database-centric information system of the armed forces.
Deputy Chief of Army Staff Lt Gen R Halgali ordered the probe into the purchase order and the Annual maintenance Contract (AMC) for Samvahak, awarded to Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), that saw a substandard bug-filled software based on obsolete Windows 2000 with bulky hardware supplied.
The payment for three quarters of AMC has already been processed in favour of BEL despite performance certificates from several field formations showing that the critical faults have led to a complete disruption of the CIDSS. Such disruptions were widely noticed across several army units in Fazilka, Suratgarh, Kota and Jaipur.
Deccan Herald’s report on April 25 (Army’s comm software is virus-prone) contained details of the failure of the system.
Earlier this month, the functioning of the pilot project under Operation Samvahak during the conduct of the theatre level exercise Shoorveer on the western borders, was supposed to be demonstrated to the Chief of Army Staff.
Defence Minister A K Antony was also supposed to take a look at the crucial project being developed for the war-time requirement.
However, both the visits were called off after the software started showing gaping holes in its design and exhibited vulnerabilities to virus and Trojan attacks that led to frequent server crash and system malfunction.
Inception of project
The CIDSS project under Operation Samvahak was sanctioned in May 1999 and was primarily meant for wartime operations. It was supposed to deal with real time flow of information, data & feedback from field units to the superior commanders and flow of policies and instructions from top to bottom.
Purchase order for phase-I of the project was issued by army in 2006.
The key players involved were BEL and a Defence Research and Development Organisation laboratory, CAIR (Centre for artificial intelligence & robotics).
Two corporate firms namely Tata Elxi and Y M Tech were also included in the Rs 130 crore project and they supplied hardware and infrastructure on behalf of BEL.
Phase-1 of Operation Samvahak could not be closed within the prescheduled deadline of 2010 as many of the system related issues remained unresolved. At this juncture army renewed the second annual maintenance contract with BEL.
While Army continues to battle with an unstable and fault prone software system that further restricts its usage by field units due to its bulky hardware, another Rs 150 crore is learnt to have been released to BEL for the Rs 900 crore second phase of the project.