NEW DELHI — The much-awaited test launch of the air version of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile has been further delayed and now India hopes to undertake the drop trials by December 2013. India had planned to conduct the test launch by December 2012. The development of the missile is already over three years behind schedule.

“There was a time when people at the airports admired us enviously. Today, they pity us.” The candid words by a senior pilot of the state-owned Air India describe the sad plight of the airline industry in India. The high cost of operating commercial aviation in India is squeezing the lifeblood out of the airline sector, which is rated as the ninth-largest civil aviation market in the world.

Challenges from archrivals Pakistan and China, and their growing arms capabilities, have forced India into a modernization drive, and its defense budget is expected to touch $50 billion in the next fiscal year. The Indian defense sector has been growing at an unprecedented rate and is now the world's leading weapons importer. A Swedish think tank that monitors global arms sales verifies that India's weapons imports have overtaken China's, which are now in second place, with 6% of global imports, as Beijing continues to build up its domestic arms industry.