Snapshot

Personal protective clothing is comprised of the bulletproof vests and executive body armours. This is one of the oldest industries the world has known. However, it was only during the World wars that extensive research was done in this field and the traditional body armour comprising of steel plates was replaced by ballistic nylon in the 1940s. It stayed in fashion for the next 30 years, till 1965, when Stephaine Kwolek a scientist working with DuPont, succeeded in producing the polymer Poly Para Phenylene Terapthalmide through polymerisation. In today’s world, it is commonly known as Kevlar and is the base fibre for most of the body armour being woven today. In addition to Kevlar, today non-woven Spectra shields are also being used as body armour.

Each jacket has about 0.6 square metres of non-woven material weighing around 750 GSM. The bulk of the jacket is made from woven material as the combination of weave and the fibre characteristics influence the energy absorption characteristics of a bullet-proof jacket. The synthetic fibre (Aramid) used in the production of bullet-proof jackets are primarily imported (DSM Netherlands/DuPont etc) with the exception of carbon glass fibre. The average life of a bulletproof jacket is about 7 years.

With the rising trend of crime, violence and terrorism, the demand for bullet-proof jackets is rising as well. The major customers of bullet-proof jackets are Defence, Paramilitary forces engaged in counter-terrorism/insurgency operations and Law enforcement agencies (police). Despite high demand, there are only a few suppliers in the market. Most of the purchase of bulletproof jackets are done via tenders floated by Ministry of Home affairs – for police and paramilitary requirement, Ministry of Defence – for requirements of Indian armed forces and by respective states in small lots. A major chunk of the demand from armed forces is catered by the Ordinance equipment factories.