Militarism, Inc.: Public Myth and Private Profit in India’s War Machine

By Moitreyo Sarkar

On 18 June 2025, India quietly underwent a historic shift in its defence procurement legacy by inviting private companies to develop the Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA), and ending the protectionist monopoly of India’s favorite Defence Public Sector Undertaking (DPSU), Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). Tata, Adani, and Larsen & Toubro (L&T) will now bid to build stealth fighters for the Indian Air Force (IAF). This historic but quite predictable move opens India’s military-industrial complex to big capital, marking a shift from state-led defence to corporate involvement. Eisenhower’s warnings about the military-industrial complex’s sway over policy for profit and power looms like a specter.  

Historically, India’s defence has been looked after by state-run ordinance factories, HAL, and the Defence Research and Development Organisation. Today, corporate bodies and private entities are vying to rush into defence manufacturing under the banner of Atmanirbhar Bharat, but this gold rush-esque race for privatisation raises a critical question: will India’s security be laissez faire or strategic autonomy and battle preparedness? Defence analyst Jawahar Bhagwat (2024) warns that “corporate interests,” rather than strategic needs increasingly drive procurement, reducing genuine strategic autonomy.

 The Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) [Image: Moitreyo Sarkar]

The Military-Peace Complex

Hannah Partis-Jennings (2021) has talked about the “military-peace complex” in Afghanistan, where military operations intertwined with private contractors, NGOs, and aid-agencies. The resultant hybrid collectif blurred warfare with humanitarianism, commodifying peace and normalising violence. Similar patterns are visible in India’s conflict-affected regions, where infrastructure projects, peace initiatives align with military logic, integrating force with governance under the guise of stability.

Militarism begins beyond military hardware—it’s a doctrinal framework interpreted into ideology in society and politics. In contemporary India, militarisation is exemplified in glorified military displays, popular media, and public discourse. Tanks and missiles of indigenous evolution are symbols in national celebrations, while Bollywood films like Uri and Border create simplistic myths, through combat glorification and transformation of violence into entertainment. Roland Barthes’ “Mythologies” shows how such myths transform complex realities into natural and socially accredited narratives, reaping gradual public acceptance of militarised ideologies or military nationalism. 

Under the current regime, India’s armed forces have become deeply embedded in performative nationalism. Retired generals feature prominently in political discourse, lending legitimacy to nationalist projects. Sushant Singh (2024) argues the traditionally apolitical military increasingly endorses partisan narratives, conflating military professionalism with political oversight. Consequently, dissent, neigh constructive criticism is vilified as anti-national, embedding militaristic attitudes into civilian life and discourse.

Securitisation and Private Military Contractors

This cultural shift is in tune with the broader securitisation of global public discourse. Post-9/11, counterterrorism rhetoric globally redefined social and political issues as existential threats, justifying increasing armed response and military intervention. India similarly views insurgencies, protests, and migration as security threats, normalising extensive surveillance—both police and vigilante. Securitisation thus contributes towards sustaining a perpetual state of emergency, marginalising democratic debate.

The US-led War on Terror introduced Private Military Contractors (PMCs), commercialising warfare. In Afghanistan, PMCs often outnumbered regular troops, handling security, logistics, and combat. While India has not fully embraced combat PMCs, it increasingly outsources military logistics, training, and cybersecurity to private firms, risking blurred lines between national security and corporate profits.

Militarisation may also manifest through growing reliance on private security firms, which vastly outnumber the official police force in India. Approximately seven million private security personnel form a parallel, largely unregulated force, providing surveillance and protection across commercial and residential spaces. This trend can be interpreted as public mistrust in state security, encouraging civilians to internalise securitised attitudes, normalising a society-wide acceptance of vigilantism and force.

Concurrently, digital platforms have facilitated civilian-led securitisation. Vigilante groups and social media cells police public and private behaviour and disperse paranoia about the alien “outsider,” reinforcing militarised identities. Such decentralised security practices exacerbate social divisions, legitimising authoritarian appeals for stricter control, along with mobilizing and stratifying labour. 

This Author, being an admirer of Karl Polanyi will take a leaf out of his book and comment that market forces unleashed by Militarisation may disrupt traditional social structures prompting societal pushback. Militarisation reshapes economies, dissolves distinctions between formal and previously informal (or even non-existent) sectors. Stuart Henry (1987) argues these shadow economies are interlinked; conflict zones generate interlinked economies in their shadow, involving arms trafficking, narcotics, even informal mercenary activities and blurring legality. India’s recent Agnipath scheme exemplifies this blurring. Soldiers discharged after short-term service often transition into private security, transferring military expertise into informal sectors and further embedding militarisation into social fabrics.

Privatisation and Rising Militarism

India now stands at a volatile confluence of rapid privatisation of defence and growing militarist sentiments along with and increasingly blurry civil-military separation. Corporate involvement in defence-industrial complexes can mean vested interests in perpetuating securitised narratives, justifying expansive military expenditures. Simultaneously, schemes like Agnipath reduce long-term military commitments, reshaping soldiers into disposable labour, thus integrating neoliberal economic practices with militaristic ideologies. 

The rise of privatization: (above) the CATS Warrior drone proposed by HAL; (below) the Akshi 7 drone by the Adani Group

The establishment of a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), initially aimed at military integration and efficiency, now reinforces political oversight and corporatisation of defence procurement. Controversial initiatives, including Agnipath, are pushed with limited debate, backed by the powerful rhetoric of nationalism. Criticism is swiftly dismissed as undermining troops, stifling democratic engagement (Singh, 2024). 

I have no whims when it comes to the national security of this nation, and I wholeheartedly support the indigenous development of a fifth-generation advanced combat aircraft. It is this authors’ genuine opinion that this project will not hit its mark without wider techno-social collaborative networks (Singh, 2025). But as militarism intensifies, so does its inherent risk. Jawaharlal Nehru cautioned that excessive militarisation breeds self-sustaining momentum—once unleashed, difficult to reverse. India’s current trajectory risks entrenching conflict, eroding democratic oversight, and prioritising private profit over public good.  The following is a good example: This author, in conversation with Max Segal, who is a U.S based analyst of strategic affairs, with experience in working with senators and Congressmen, asked about how one can read the efforts of U.S based peace activists along with the huge role that the American Military Industrial Complex plays in the nation’s socio-economic stability. Segal replied that due to the huge swathes of population involved in weapons manufacturing in certain industrial regions of America, amending legislation to cut off arms supply becomes a delicate matter as it involves the livelihoods of many. The question of peace therefore becomes self-perpetuating.  

To counter this path of fire, India must demystify militaristic myths, and restore or bring about rigorous critical democratic oversight. Transparent governance must replace the paranoia of jingoist military nationalism, instead focusing on fast-tracked genuine development and public safety. Otherwise, the promised security from militarisation may lead not to safety and prosperity, but to self-perpetuating systematic instability and the tightening reins of authoritarianism. 

References

  Barthes, Roland. "Roland Barthes – Paris Match – Semiotics." BLACK PROPAGANDA, September 11, 2010. https://blackpropaganda.wordpress.com/2010/09/11/roland-barthes-paris-match-semiotics/.

  Bhagwat, J. "Strategic Autonomy in National Security Defence Procurement Choices." Economic and Political Weekly 59, no. 41 (2024): 51.

  Henry, Stuart. "The Political Economy of Informal Economies." The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 493, no. 1 (1987): 137-153. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716287493001010.

  Kundu, Apurba. Militarism in India: The Army and Civil Society in Consensus. London: Tauris Academic Studies, 1998.

  Mabee, Bryan, and Srdjan Vucetic. "Varieties of Militarism." Security Dialogue 49, nos. 1-2 (2018): 96-108. https://doi.org/10.1177/0967010617743084.

  Parashar, Swati. "Discursive (In)Securities and Postcolonial Anxiety: Enabling Excessive Militarism in India." Security Dialogue 49, nos. 1-2 (2018): 123-135.

  Partis-Jennings, Hannah. The Military-Peace Complex: Gender and Materiality in Afghanistan. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781474453349.

  Sarkar, Moitreyo. "Fighting for a Future." Unpublished paper presented at ILSR, ECRC 2025 conference, June 23, 2025.

  Singh, Sushant. "How the Military Fell in Line with Modi’s Political Project." The Caravan, January 31, 2024. https://caravanmagazine.in/security/military-modi-political-project.

  Singh, Sushant. "Tour of Duty Model Could Add to Majoritarian Violence and Affect Army Efficiency." The Caravan, April 21, 2022.

  Singh, Sushant. "Air Chief Marshal Warning." The Caravan, June 18, 2025. https://caravanmagazine.in/security/air-chief-marshal-warning

  "No more monopoly: High-stakes contest for 5th-gen fighter begins, private players to take on HAL." The Print, June 18, 2025. https://theprint.in/defence/no-more-monopoly-high-stakes-contest-for-5th-gen-fighter-begins-private-players-to-take-on-hal/2662490/.

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Moitreyo Sarkar is an independent scholar specializing in military labour and critical military studies. He has completed his higher education in Sociology from Presidency University, Kolkata.