New Delhi: A Central Electricity Authority (CEA) committee has drawn up a three-year trajectory for replacing imported Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems across India's power grid with domestically built ones. The panel has set financial year milestones running from 2026-27 to 2028-29 for 38 software modules and 25 hardware items. It follows a Ministry of Power decision that the systems are not to be imported after 2030.
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The committee has also placed on record how little of the present system is Indian. Despite a 50 percent minimum local content mandate under the Make in India order for the power sector, grid-level SCADA systems carry less than 20 percent local content. The Ministry of Power had earlier granted exemptions from the requirement to GRID-INDIA, then POSOCO, on October 4, 2022, and to Power Grid on May 30, 2023.
The trigger was the Prime Minister's sectoral review meeting of December 3, 2025, where indigenisation of imported SCADA systems was flagged as an action point on self-reliance and cyber-resilience.
The Ministry of Power communicated the decision of Secretary (Power) on December 12, 2025, that the "SCADA system is not to be imported beyond 2030 and efforts have to be initiated for Indigenisation of SCADA system". CEA was asked to propose a trajectory after consulting stakeholders.
A committee was constituted on December 16, 2025 under the chairmanship of Member (Planning), CEA. Its members were drawn from six CEA divisions, MNRE, DRDO, Power Grid, Grid India, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), IEEMA and the state load despatch centres of Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. It was given one month to report.
At its first meeting on December 24, 2025, the committee set the bar above the procurement threshold. The report records that "the committee's mandate extends beyond meeting minimum local content requirement and the aim is to eliminate import dependence by ensuring SCADA systems are made available by the Indian entities."
SCADA is the system through which generation, transmission and distribution are monitored and controlled in real time. Master stations at the national, regional and state load despatch centres receive field data from remote terminal units at substations and power plants, and send control commands back over the communication network.
Of the 38 software modules, the committee has placed core acquisition and communication functions — SCADA, ICCP communication, CFE communication, the historian, web server applications and load forecasting — in 2026-27. Most energy management system functions, including the state estimator, contingency analysis, optimal power flow and automatic generation control, fall in 2027-28. Four items, including the transmission corridor capability monitor, the outage scheduler and the dispatcher training simulator, are placed in 2028-29.
One module is left out. On virtualisation software, the report states: "Virtualisation Software is Commercial off the Shelf Software, presently developed on Open-source and global providers are available. There is lack of Commercial viability for domestic development."
On the 25 hardware items, the committee has concluded that 16 can be developed within two years. It has also accepted that most of this category will not be driven by the Power Ministry at all. These are largely telecom and IT networking items, the power sector is a small buyer, and the Make in India trajectory set by MeitY and the Department of Telecommunications will prevail for them. On the committee's own assessment of the cost structure, software accounts for around 25 percent of a SCADA system's cost and hardware for the remaining 75 percent.
The report sets out the operational problems with the present arrangement before it reaches national security. It states that "SCADA systems serve as the central nervous system of the National Power Grid—enabling the 'One Nation, One Grid, One Frequency' framework through real-time monitoring and control," and that "heavy dependence on foreign OEMs with proprietary technologies results in interoperability constraints, delays in customisation, limited flexibility in system enhancements, and dependence on external support services."
On the security case, the report says: "Reliance on foreign technologies for critical infrastructure may expose utilities to supply chain disruptions, technology access constraints, delayed availability of upgrades and support, and limited transparency associated with proprietary or 'black box' systems."
It identifies a specific operational cost of the current model. "Database modifications and model updates frequently require OEM intervention because of proprietary database structures and vendor controlled engineering tools, restricting customisation and increasing vendor dependence," the report says. It adds that common information model exchanges produced by different OEMs are often not interoperable, which limits the exchange of network models between SLDCs, RLDCs and the NLDC.
This is not CEA's first trajectory for indigenous SCADA. A team constituted by the Ministry of Power on October 20, 2020 submitted a report on the same subject on September 1, 2021, after taking inputs from 35 utilities.
The minutes of the second meeting record Chief Engineer (ET&I), CEA noting that "despite CEA's 2021 SCADA indigenisation report with defined timelines, no progress has been made."
The committee has not settled the institutional model. Chief Engineer (ET&I), CEA, argued for a National SCADA Mission. Member (Planning), CEA and the C-DAC representative held that a working group was more appropriate, given that the work involves capabilities already at a relatively high technology readiness level. Power Grid, STQC and DRDO supported a mission-like structure for time-bound coordination. The report recommends both options and leaves the choice to the ministry.
The development model is similarly open. Power Grid and GRID-India backed nomination, citing the procedural complexity of competitive bidding. PRDC proposed a limited expression of interest with grant-based support. DRDO pointed to the lead system integrator model used in defence projects, while Kalkitech proposed a consortium with system operators as co-developers, with seed funding for a minimum viable product.
On what indigenisation must mean, GRID-India took the strictest position, and the chair endorsed it. The minutes record its view that "indigenisation must mean 100 percent indigenous development, including source code, architecture and lifecycle support, without dependence on foreign vendors for routine modifications."
Under nomination, the report suggests a government PSU with SCADA experience such as C-DAC could be named. Or under the consortium route, it suggests Power Grid or GRID-India could float an expression of interest (EoI) within a year.
The committee has identified validation, not development, as the harder half. It has recommended that a platform for testing indigenous SCADA modules, including cybersecurity testing, be set up within two years with government funding. It has proposed 24 months for testing of developed modules, running in parallel with development.
The Central Power Research Institute (CPRI) told the committee that the testing regime does not yet exist. There is at present "no dedicated cybersecurity/reliability testing for SCADA beyond basic acceptance tests (even for imported software)," it said. That holds for the imported systems already running the grid, not just for the indigenous ones being planned.
The Standardisation Testing and Quality Certification Directorate (STQC) offered to fill the gap. It can run Common Criteria certification and IEC 62443 assessments, it told the committee, and can examine the development process itself rather than only the finished product. The Common Criteria route for IT, though, runs eight to ten months and demands heavy documentation, CPRI said. STQC's own testing is voluntary at present, not mandatory. Power Grid's concern was cost. Security testing is expensive, it told the committee, and it asked for a provision to reimburse the fee.
For field validation, SLDC Odisha has volunteered a testing environment. The proposal is to have selected RTUs report simultaneously to the existing SLDC system and to a new sub-SLDC running indigenous software, allowing real-time comparison without displacing the live system.
Not everything can be brought home at once, and the committee has said so. Processors and real-time operating systems sit in its long-term category, apart from the components it expects Indian industry to supply within the next three years.
The C-DAC set out how far the indigenous chip effort has reached. Its Vega series 32-bit microcontrollers are already in production, and are being type tested for use in indigenous smart meters. The 64-bit devices, single-core, dual-core and server-class, are in pilot fabrication in Taiwan. For servers, C-DAC said three transfer-of-technology partners are in place.
Member (Planning), CEA, put a different route to the committee. SCADA does a narrow set of things, he said, it scans, stores and forwards, so instead of building on general-purpose processors, India could design application-specific integrated circuits for the job.
On the software side, SLDC Odisha pointed the committee to work already done. IIT Bombay's POWERANSER Lab has developed and supplied SCADA and phasor measurement unit-based application software, it said, and that could be carried into indigenous energy management system development.
However, all of it depends on funding. The committee has accepted that government support will be needed, and has named the Power System Development Fund as a possible source. Grid India has asked for a dedicated funding mechanism, through government grants or another sustainable route.
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The same condition runs through the committee's finding. The country "has the technical capability to indigenise SCADA systems within the 2026-27-to-2028-29-time window, subject to appropriate funding, testing ecosystem, and implementation support," it concluded.
