DPSU dividend cheques worth Rs 3,951 crore changed hands in New Delhi on Tuesday, as Defence Minister Rajnath Singh completed the annual performance review of 16 Defence Public Sector Undertakings, released four new publications on the sector's indigenisation drive, and urged the DPSUs to aim for global scale.

Minister of State for Defence Sanjay Seth also attended.

The review was confirmed in a statement from the Press Information Bureau. It was held under the Department of Defence Production at the Ministry of Defence in New Delhi.


Seven DPSU chiefs hand over dividend cheques

Secretary (Defence Production) Sanjeev Kumar and the Chairmen and Managing Directors of the DPSUs briefed Singh on performance, achievements and the road ahead.

The briefing covered indigenous production and manufacturing capability, development of advanced defence technologies, growth in defence exports, strengthening of supply chains, and the execution of major ongoing projects across the 16 companies, according to the ministry's own account of the meeting.

Seven of the DPSUs, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL), Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL), Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited (GRSE), BEML and MIDHANI, presented dividend cheques to Singh for the government's equity shares for financial year 2025-26. The DPSU dividend cheques were worth a combined Rs 3,951 crore, a return on decades of state ownership across the seven companies.

HAL and MDL carry the largest order books among the seven, tied to the armed forces' aircraft and shipbuilding programmes respectively.

Alongside them sits fellow DPSU Bharat Dynamics Limited, which has been supplying HAL with Helina launchers and countermeasure dispensing system components on a separate production track that also feeds into the sector's overall turnover.

DPSU dividend cheques cap a year of record output

India's overall defence production for 2025-26 came in at approximately Rs 1.8 lakh crore, with DPSUs contributing Rs 1.29 lakh crore of that total, Singh said.

He called the figure a reflection of the country's progress toward an Aatmanirbhar defence industrial base, and commended the DPSUs for strengthening India's defence manufacturing ecosystem while advancing that vision. Singh noted that all 16 DPSUs are recording achievements across multiple sectors, from shipbuilding to specialty metallurgy, and congratulated the organisations for their continued dedication through the year under review.

The figures build on numbers Prime Minister Narendra Modi cited earlier this year, when he pointed to India's defence production and export gains as part of the same Aatmanirbhar Bharat push, and follow on from the annual performance review that was first scheduled for this week.

Singh calls on DPSUs to become "global giants"

Singh urged the DPSUs to focus on timely delivery, cut import dependency, turn R&D into technology leadership, push exports to newer heights, lift productivity through capex expansion, back start-ups and MSMEs, and match global quality standards.

"The progress of DPSUs is not merely an economic or industrial necessity, it is a national security imperative. Recent global conflicts have demonstrated how crucial assured supply chains, surge capacity, critical spares, rapid repair capabilities, and the ability to sustain production during prolonged conflicts are for any nation," he said.

"In pursuit of the Make in India, Make for the World objective, we must resolve to transform all DPSUs into global giants," Singh added.

R&D success measured beyond spend, Singh says

On research spending, Singh welcomed the rise in DPSU investment but set a different yardstick for judging it.

Success should be measured not by the amount spent but by the development of new technologies, intellectual property, prototypes and operational products, he said. "We must identify niche technology areas where India can become not just self-reliant, but a global leader," he added.

Singh also called on the DPSUs to keep raising product quality toward global benchmarks as part of the wider Make in India, Make for the World effort he had outlined earlier in the address.

Four books released at the review

Singh released four publications at the event.

The first, Aatmanirbhar DPSU, A Journey of DPSUs towards Self-Reliance, sets out indigenisation targets for existing items along with new products and processes the sector plans to adopt over the next five years. DISHA is framed as a schools and industry interaction initiative, meant to give students hands-on exposure to defence technologies and modern manufacturing processes.

The remaining two publications are specific to HAL, a Modernisation Roadmap charting the company's transformation into a future-ready aerospace enterprise, and an Indigenisation Roadmap covering its aero and defence sectors.

All four titles were framed at the event as documenting the DPSU sector's push toward self-reliance, indigenisation, innovation and future-ready manufacturing capability, released on the same day as the dividend cheques and Singh's remarks on turning the sector's DPSUs into global-scale manufacturers.