The Controller General of Defence Accounts (CGDA) is scaling up the use of artificial intelligence and advanced data analytics to strengthen financial governance and decision-making within the Defence Accounts Department, Vishvajit Sahay, Controller General of Defence Accounts, said at the stone-laying ceremony of the National Academy of Defence Financial Management (NADFM) in Pune.

As part of this expansion, CGDA is enhancing its training infrastructure in Pune. The new NADFM campus will enable long-term professional training for Indian Defence Accounts Service (IDAS) officers and conduct Defence Financial Management courses for personnel from the Army, Navy and Air Force, as well as organisations such as the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Coast Guard and others.

Sahay said the Defence Accounts Department holds one of the largest pools of financial data within the Ministry of Defence and is now working to centralise and analyse this data using artificial intelligence. The objective is to generate meaningful, real-time inputs to support executive decision-making for both the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance.

To build a robust research and analytics ecosystem, a dedicated research cell on defence finance and economics is being seeded at the Arun Jaitley National Institute of Financial Management (AJNIFM) in Faridabad, where probationers of various accounts services currently undergo training. This research function will later be shifted to the new academy campus and is envisioned as the primary research arm for defence finance and economics.

Artificial intelligence will play a central role in analysing defence budgets, studying defence inflation indices and examining global trends in weapons and equipment procurement. “Technology is evolving rapidly, and AI and machine learning will be integral to how we process and interpret defence financial data,” Sahay said.

To support this transformation, the Defence Accounts Department has established the Institute for Technology and Software Development Centre (ITSDC) in Hyderabad and Secunderabad. The centre has been tasked with deploying artificial intelligence to analyse centralised defence financial data and provide decision-support tools for senior management.

Sahay also highlighted the upcoming Sampoorna system, a comprehensive digital procurement management platform designed to track defence acquisitions from initiation to final payment. The system will create a rich, end-to-end procurement database, enabling advanced analytics and improving transparency and efficiency in defence procurement, particularly as indigenisation accelerates and multiple vendors participate in the process.

With defence procurement spending exceeding Rs 4 lakh crore annually, including a capital outlay of Rs 2.2 lakh crore, AI-enabled systems such as Sampoorna are expected to play a critical role in strengthening data-driven governance across the defence ecosystem.