DRDO was established in 1956 with the aim of developing indigenous technological base for Indian defence services. ISRO was established in 1969 for developing space technology and planetary exploration, which is helpful for scientific researches. Why Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is considered as a successful organisation and Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) as a failure?
We cannot say DRDO is a failed organisation because it has developed various missiles and satellites for ISRO, Indian Army, Navy and Airforce. AGNI, TRISHUL, BRAHMOS, AKASH etc., are some of the successful missiles of DRDO. Then what is the reason behind considering DRDO an unsuccessful organisation?
Nearly 60%- 70% of the nuclear experiments and missile launches are failure, which is higher than ISRO, and the delay in their given projects made them considering an unsuccessful organisation. We can’t access the projects completed successful by DRDO because of national security issues, nearly 25% of projects are not published to national media as directed by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).
DRDO is a Research And Development (R&D) concept, which includes success and failures. Also, behind the success of ISRO there are great minds like Satish Dhawan, Vikram Sarabhai and A.P.J. Abdul Kalam who provided many methodologies on how to develop and run an organisation.
In the Financial Year (FY) 2021-22, ISRO (Department of Space) has been allocated ₹13,949.09 crores, which is nearly 900 crores over 2020-21 allocated budget. Whereas, DRDO was allocated the amount of ₹11,375 crore, which is 8% more allowances than FY 2020-21.
One of the main reason considering DRDO a failed organisation is because of procuring several missiles and aircraft from various nations like France, United States, United Kingdom, Russia, Iran etc., whereas, with ISRO various foreign satellites were planned and launched from Sriharikota Range (SHAR). BIRD (Germany), SPOT-6 (France), LEMUR-2-JOEL (US) are some satellites launched by ISRO. Recently, AMAZONIA 1 (Brazil) was launched by New Space India Limited (NSIL), a commercial agency under ISRO.
Recently, an anti-COVID-19 therapeutic drug has been developed by a lab under DRDO, Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS) in collaboration with Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL), Hyderabad. It allowed moderate to severe COVID-19 patients to use the drug in an emergency. clinal trials prove that this drug may reduce the dependence of patients on oxygen cylinders.
Evidently DRDO is not completely a failed organisation, lack of sufficient funds and human resources in the past made the organisation idle, followed by failures and unreliability. ISRO on the other hand triumphed by the innovation of Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), most of the foreign satellites launched by India are by using this (PSLV) launch vehicle.