NEW DELHI. Nov 10 . The Defence Ministry has taken a series of measures to prune expenditure in view of the marginal increase in budgetary allocation for the current year, with the target of saving 8 billion Rupees (307 million US Dollars), the Economic Times reported today, says Xinhua.

Addressing the conference of economic editors here, last week the Minister of State for Defense. Krishna Kumar, said that the ministry planned to raise an additional 20 billion Rupees (769 million US Dollars) by disposing of stores and spares which the armed forces had accumulated over the years. The resources will be used to meet the modernisation requirements of the armed forces.

India's defense outlay in the current 1991-92 financial year is at 163.5 billion Rupees (6.3 billion US Dollars), atout four per cent higher than 1990-91 in Rupee term. '

Kumar said the armed forces had been badly hit by the foreign exchange crisis. As a result, defense undertakings had started exploring markets abroad to export surplus production for earning foreign exchanges.

The Minister refused to confirm whether a reduction in the manpower was being contemplated In the context of cutting costs. He said, however. that the Defense Ministry would sell surplus land in many parts of the country to raise resources.