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REVEALED: How an Indian missile lay unguarded at South Korean port

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Indiatoday.in
IndiaToday.in New Delhi, August 7, 2014

Around 10 months ago, India had showcased its newly developed Pragati tactical surface-to-surface missile at the International Aerospace and Defence Exhibition ADEX-2013 in South Korea.pragati missile

But in a major security lapse, the missile didn’t make its journey back home and lay unguarded, vulnerable and dangerously exposed for an entire month at a South Korean port.
The missile, developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), has a range of 60-170 km.

India Today has learnt that the Modi government has sounded the code red and decided to investigate the entire matter. The government wants to revisit a never before security scare for India’s missile programme.

Pragati is a highly potent and accurate short-range, battlefield tactical missile system capable of neutralising identified ground targets and providing an effective counter-force weapon system.

It has all weather day and night operational launch capability. It is a counter to Pakistan’s NASR tactical nuclear missile and crucial in maintaining India’s strategic edge over an unpredictable neighbour.

There is a series of violations in the journey of Pragati missile to South Korea.

The first violation is that the Pragati missile sent to South Korea for the exhibition wasn’t a dummy missile but an actual prototype that was to be used for a live firing.
Second, the logistical handling of the missile in South Korea was outsourced to a local agent of Chinese-origin.

Third, the prototype missile missed its ship back to India, stranding it unguarded and vulnerable at the Incheon port for an entire month. Finally, it lumbered back to India as unprotected commercial cargo without the safeguards it needed as sensitive military hardware.

The Pragati missile has quick reaction from command to launch in ripple firing mode of less than five seconds from same launcher. It is capable of carrying various types of conventional warhead of approximately 200 Kg.

The missile system has capability of deployment in stand-alone mode or centralised mode. With its effective and intelligent end trajectory maneuvreing, Pragati defeats detection by any weapon locating radar.

 

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India-Israel joint venture to manufacture missiles fails to take off

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Jatinder Kaur Tur, TNN Nov 14, 2013, 12.01PM IST

HYDERABAD: The joint venture between India’s Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) and Israeli Aerospace Industry to manufacture Long Range Surface-to-Air Missile (LR SAM) and Medium Range Surface-to-Air Missile (MR-SAM) has turned out to be a non-starter.

The long range missiles were to have been delivered to the Indian Navy by 2012 while the medium range missiles should be in the Indian Air Force weaponry by 2017. However, both the delivery schedules are way behind schedule and show no signs of meeting them even in the near future.DRDO officials are blaming the lack of progress in the joint venture due to lack of transparency and non-transfer of technology by their Israeli counterparts. And the recent trials that were conducted by the Indian defence organization failed to meet the standards of both the IAF and the Indian Navy. The entire cost of Rs 12,500 crore of the joint venture is being funded by India and the inordinate delay and lack of progress in the project has turned into a big cause of worry in the defence ministry.

According to sources, the LR-SAMs project was commissioned in 2006 and the delivery of the missiles to the Indian Navy should have happened by 2012. Similarly, the MR-SAM venture was signed in 2009 and the missiles are to be delivered to the Indian Air Force by 2017. Both both the projects are way behind schedule and show no signs of making progress.

“Frankly speaking, right now, not much is going on in the joint venture due to various issues between the two sides. Expecting Israel to share its technology with India is unfair. But such things should have been clarified before the joint venture was entered into,” said an official.

DRDO is maintaining that it is because of the lack of transfer of technology that the trials conducted so far have ended up as failures. “Industries are merely getting the drawings as to how to produce certain systems and such things are leading to deviations from the laid down specifications because the knowledge to develop the systems is not being imparted,” said sources.

DRDO officials are also attributing the delay to a complicated and long procedure involving shuttling between India and Israel for various stages of development of a system etc. The Hyderabad-based Indian defence organization also reportedly found itself helpless on problems in propulsion system and other related issues while a significant number of parts or systems are yet to be tested following a delay in manufacturing.

However, when quizzed on the issue, DRDO Director General Avinash Chander told the TOI that nothing was amiss. “Everything is going on as per the plan and development trials are on. We shall be able to deliver the MR-SAMs as per schedule. Right now, the contribution from India in the joint venture project is about 20% and would ultimately reach 80% in the final stages.” Regarding the already delayed LR-SAM, DRDO officials declined to come on record.

MR-SAM, one of the major demands of the forces, is to have a range of 70 kms or so, and the IAF is banking on replacing its ageing Soviet-made Pechora SAM missiles with the MR-SAMs. But nobody is sure how long the wait is going to be, and whether the delivery will take place at all.

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Chinks in the Armour – What ail DRDO, India’s Premier Defence Organigation?

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Rediff.com – News-Special Part- III

‘DRDO took up Arjun before it learnt to make tanks’

George Iype

Some 20 years ago, the defence ministry entrusted the DRDO with two projects: the development of a battle tank and a multi-barrel rocket launcher system.

The DRDO called the former, assigned to it in 1974, Arjun, and the latter Pinaka.

Two-plus decades later, the Arjun is considered a major failure. And so is the Pinaka. The Indian army found the latter passed only seven of its 29 requirements.

Defence experts allege that DRDO continues to work on Arjun and Pinaka just to keep its laboratories open.

“The Arjun main battle tank is not world class and has failed to meet the required levels of accuracy. But DRDO is keeping it alive because it does not want its factories to close down,” says Major General (retd) Ashok Mehta.

Experts like Major General Mehta feel the Arjun could have been a tank with potential if DRDO had got its act together. But the premier defence research organisation continues to exert pressure on the army to accept a limited series of production for the Arjun.

Army officers say it is politics and not the tank’s potential that is at work in the defence ministry, which last year placed orders with the Avadi Ordinance Factory to manufacture 124 Arjun tanks.

“I am happy to inform you that not only is the army satisfied with the Arjun tank’s performance, but it has placed an order for 124 more such tanks,” Defence Minister George Fernandes had told Parliament. “With this India has achieved the capability for indigenous manufacture of battle tanks.”

Army officials, however, say no other defence agency in the world must have spent 25 years and Rs 3.5 billion on developing a tank that has failed to perform.

“We have wasted money and time in producing a tank that is just not a world class product these days,” an army officer in Hyderabad says.

Insiders say the army was not “satisfied with the Arjun’s performance” as Fernandes claimed, but was coerced to accept it by the DRDO.

N K Mohan Pillai, a retired army officer who witnessed the Arjun trials, says the tank lacked three vital strengths. First, its engine is weak. Second, its suspension needs permanent maintenance. Third, its gun control is not accurate enough to obtain first round kill probability.

“In fact, the main problem was that DRDO took up the Arjun project before learning how to make tanks,” Pillai remarks.

In 1994 when DRDO announced that the Arjun tank was ready for production, then army chief General B C Joshi witnessed the trials. He sent a note to the DRDO and the defence minister saying the tank fails to meet standards and therefore was unacceptable. General Joshi then laid down a dozen imperatives that DRDO should take to improve upon the tank.

General Joshi’s main concerns were that the tank that weighs 57 tonnes lacked armour protection and vital suspension for crew comfort and gunfire accuracy.

But DRDO, which has showcased the Arjun as its finest indigenous product, claims that the problem is not with the tank, but with the army.

“The army is used to handling only T-72 tanks. For the soldiers who have fired T-72 tanks, operating the Arjun is a gigantic task. So we have told the army to train their crew before accusing us of inferior production,” a DRDO engineer says.

Despite DRDO’s claims, many in the army believe that the 124 Arjun tanks will drain the exchequer just like the multi-barrel rocket launching system Pinaka did.

In 1999 the Comptroller and Auditor General severely indicted DRDO for its failure to develop critical components for Pinaka after spending Rs 424.5 million on the project.

The defence ministry had entrusted DRDO with the Pinaka project in 1980. The deadline given was 1994. Twenty years later DRDO is nowhere near finishing. The war heads and all the three vehicles necessary for launching the rockets are yet to be developed by DRDO. Against the requirement of eight types of warheads, only three have been developed. Of this, one is not acceptable to the army and the other is only a dummy.

“The delay in the development of the EWPinaka has compelled the army to depend on our existing 20 kilometre-range system even during Kargil conflict. The DRDO is entirely responsible for this,” charges an army officer.

According to experts, the Pinaka system has met just seven of the 29 requirements of the army during trials. The indigenous rocket launcher lacks the promised range, fire power, loading time of the salvo and deployment time.

These, however, are “minor problems” according to DRDO.

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Zero for DRDO

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Bharat Karnad | 26th Apr 2013 – Deccan Chronicle

The Indian Air Force has been clever over the years in a petty sort of way. Short-range or medium-range combat aircraft and so on are uniquely IAF nomenclature; no other Air Force has such categories. In the age of aerial tankers, describing warplanes by their radii of action is a distraction.

Forty years ago the IAF invented another category of warplanes — “deep penetration and strike aircraft”, which permitted the purchase of Jaguar. The IAF sees this sort of thing as a harmless ruse to serve its interest.

The multiplicity of combat aircraft thus procured allows, the service belie­ves, in a crisis to at least have some squadrons in its fleet not subject to sanctions or the spares-and-servicing tourniquet, which supplier countries in greater or lesser measure always apply, depending on their foreign policy goals and national interests of the moment, and which tool of manipulation is now legitimated by the recent Arms Trade Treaty.

This policy of buying aircraft from diverse sources was first articulated in a 2006 note from Air Headquarters (AHQ) to the ministry of defence (MoD), which stated that the requirement for a sub-30-ton fully loaded combat aircraft was being deliberately proposed to escape the Russian stranglehold, and avoid going in for more Sukhoi-30 MKIs or the upgraded variant the “Super” Sukhois. Thus, Rafale passed the spurious test, clocking in at 27 tons. Of course, the IAF-invented range-dictated categories serve another purpose. They confuse generalist civil servants in the MoD and convincing clueless politicians that there are big gaps in combat aircraft numbers which need filling.

In this game of “fool you, fool me”, where the IAF is being jerked around by supplier countries, the threat to national security stays unaddressed. IAF is principally to blame, of course. But the inability of the Aeronautical Dev­e­lo­p­ment Agency (ADA) and other Defence Res­earch and Development Organisation (DRDO) units tasked with aircraft and on-board systems designs, and the sheer incompetence of Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) are equally responsible.

So criminally negligent has HAL been that in all the years it assembled a variety of MiG-21s, MiG-27s, MiG-29s, and the Jaguar, and the power plants for each of these aircraft at its Koraput factory, it failed to maintain a dat­abase. In other words, for all the licence manufacturing it has done over the years, by failing to compile how every component in the aircraft and in the engines does what and how, it has learnt nothing.

Had HAL maintained a database of all the items it has put together, the country by now would have had the built-up capability to manufacture the Tejas Mk-I and Mk-II on the run. But this defence pu­blic sector unit has red­uced its­elf to an adjunct of supplier companies. That top HAL leadership has not been brought to acc­ount on this score and that the Indian taxpayer continues funding such profligacy only reflects the state of things.

DRDO, on its part, has prospered by creating illusion. Other than in certain areas, such as in writing sophisticated software and devising complex algorithms to drive military systems, DRDO projects are mostly scams. Behind every project that’s touted for realising “self-sufficiency” lies imported technology in some guise. In fact, it has been so grossly inept in not insisting on total transfer of technology from its partners that foreign defence firms happily strike deals in which Indian monies fund the development of state-of-the-art technology in other countries but get nothing out of it except finished high-cost products.

It is not the fault of the supplier firms that DRDO has proved so inattentive, gullible, and plain reckless with public monies. Take for example the advanced medium-range and long-range missile systems supposedly being collaboratively developed with Israel. Except in striking a contract for `15,000 crore, DRDO settled for only a work-share arra­ngement and that too to fabricate the low-value backend of these missile systems, with the Israeli company retaining the intell­ectual property rights on all the technology so developed.

A similar deal for a short-range missile system with Dassault Aviation has just been signed and another `30,000 crore is consequently going down the drain. Because in this business suckers are not given an even chance, the foreign companies can hardly be blamed for exploiting DRDO’s unwillingness to leverage India’s financial subsidy to obtain full proprietary and production rights for all technologies generated in such projects. So what is the department of defence finance doing other than sleeping on the job?

If DRDO brass were to be hauled up, it would be like pulling out a foundational stone that could bring the whole fraudulent public sector defence industrial edifice that, notwithstanding its claims, has produced no original technology after the Marut HF-24 in the 1970s, tumbling down. It is the reason why the Naresh Chandra Committee’s recommendation that the offices of scientific adviser to defence minister, head of DRDO, and secretary defence R&D be separated, may never get implemented. There are too many vested interests in the armed services, DRDO, and DPSUs who have it good to want this situation to change.

Coming back to Rafale, had Reliance Aerospace gone about it the right way it could have emulated Larsen & Tubro (L&T), which has indigenously developed the engineering, tooling, and manufacturing capability to locally produce everything from nuclear-powered and conventional submarines of any design to artillery systems. This proactive attitude to build up its all-round capability means it is in a position to benefit from “transfer of technology” portions of deals for high-value weapons platforms India has signed in the past two decades, and very quickly to absorb foreign technologies India pays for but which, owing to the complete inability and incompetence of defence public sector units, has to-date not capitalised on. We are talking cumulatively of waste now reaching the thousand billion dollar-level.

If the L&T business model is too onerous, Reliance Aerospace, instead of turning itself into a mere cog in the Dassault Aviation machine by channelling payoffs to the right quarters in the ruling party to lubricate the Rafale deal, could have tried to buy off large chunks of the Rafale-maker, Dassault Aviation itself, as the Tatas have done by purchasing the South African company Denel’s entire 155mm/52 calibre Howitzer line. That might have been the second-best strategy to become a commercially viable defence production entity in double-quick time and do right by the country as well.

The writer is a professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

Comments

by Air Cmde Raghub… (not verified) on Fri, 2013-04-26 22:43
Zero sum Game.Only history will tell whether DRDO has been zero or hero. Import of even obsolescent BMD would have cost us fortune which DRDO has been able to save. Calling Names.. If IAF has managed to get its magnificent flying machines from diverse sources instead of all from Russia without love-it has been smart move by them for which they need to be lauded? Jaguars & Mirages have served us well as Canberra’s & Hunters did? HAL & ADA. The two are incomparable and class apart. While HAL has hardly picked up any worthwhile aviation technology during its half a century of assembling MiG’s & missiles in its sprawling MiG complexes- ADA has developed fourth generation plus Tejas. Flight testing & overcoming problems during development takes time but rewarding eventually. Successes as Scams? It is much easier to call a success a scam than calling a spade a spade. If DRDO has made use of some imported technology where is the problem? Most of the defence technologies are copied all over the world sans any qualms or copyright compulsions.155×52 or Desi Bofors will be copy work of some technologies. Russian K-13A air to air missile was true copy of the the US Sidewinder-without being a scam. Missiles. The learned author can rest assured that no short, medium or long range missiles can take India for a ride in any missile deal till Dr VK Saraswat is around. A scientist who has successfully lead us to the ICBM regime must have seen some technology benefit in these collaborations.

by MVP (not verified) on Sat, 2013-04-27 17:57
The so called DRDO Scientists are busy playing Golf in the DRDO Phase-II Township Golf Course, Bangalore. Unlike the soldiers, risking their lives in difficult terrains, a majority of these scientists enjoy their entire life (doing very little official work) in splendid townships, utilising CSD facilities, many festival holidays, discussing (obviously during office hours) and buying /investing in plots of land, flats etc. without concern to build good quality weapons at the shortest possible time. They do research(at tax payers expense) without any urgency to complete the tasks with an end result in mind. They should be made accountable for each and every pie of tax payers money. In case of not meeting the deadline, the scientists should be asked to reimburse back to the Govt. of India 50% of the salary drawn.

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Oldies of DRDO cling on to their jobs post retirement

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 Gautam Datt   |   MAIL TODAY  |   New Delhi, October 25, 2012 

P.S. Krishnan and Avinash Chander.

Dozens of top scientists at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) are working on extended tenures despite the government disfavouring the policy of retaining officers or specialists after their retirement.

According to guidelines, tenures can be extended only in “exceptional circumstances”. The DRDO, however, justifies the extensions, saying only valued experts whose replacements are not easy to find are given the privilege.

In response to an RTI query, sought by Rajeev Chauhan of Meerut, the DRDO released a list of 37 scientists – 12 of them in the distinguished category – who are working on extended tenures. This was disclosed only after the intervention of the chief information commissioner following an appeal.

Defence scientists retire at the age of 60. The department of personnel and training (DoPT) rules for extension of specialists in the medical and scientific fields mention the problems in giving such experts extra tenure.

Oldies of DRDO

“Not only does the next man miss promotion but often several people miss consequential promotions all along the hierarchy,” the department noted.

Keeping this in mind, procedures were evolved to ensure that extensions to the superannuating scientists are resorted to only in really exceptional circumstances, the guidelines said.

The main conditions are that the “retiring specialist should not just be one of the outstanding officers but is really head and shoulders above the rest, or the other specialists are not ripe enough to take over the job”. The DRDO, however, claims that while it largely adheres to the DoPT rules, they are not strictly applicable to the strategic community which also includes ISRO and atomic energy.

Sources said the DRDO has 7,000 scientists out of which extension to 37-odd experts is “minuscule”. The DRDO follows merit- based flexible complementing scheme for promotions which is not linked to availability of vacancies, they said. They feel that most people at 60 are still active and gain substantial wealth of experience in highly specialised areas that needs to be tapped.

Some big names are on extended terms and are vital to the success of their respective programmes.

Topping the list is Avinash Chander, chief controller of missiles and strategic system, who is steering the long range strategic missiles programme.

The list of 37 scientists includes 12 distinguished scientists, 13 scientists “H” and remaining 12 scientists “G”. While detractors allege that extensions indicate a system of favouritism, the DRDO says every case passes through two expert panels which approve the move.

According to govt guidelines, tenures can be extended only in exceptional circumstances.

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Hurting DRDO’s autonomy

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R SUNDARAM The Hindu Business Line

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is in the news. First, the good news. It successfully test-fired nuclear-capable Agni III long range missile with a strike range of 3,000 km from the Wheeler Islands off the coast of Odisha, recently. This is a major achievement both for the DRDO and the country’s defence capability.

Now, for the bad news. DRDO’s financial and administrative powers have been whittled down or taken away. This is a blow for science and technology efforts in India.

SUDDEN ABOUT-TURN

Only two years ago, in 2010 to be precise, the delegation of powers to the DRDO was considerably liberalised. It seemed as though the government was, for once, serious about freeing scientific establishment from the proverbial red tape.

It allowed DRDO the discretion to spend up to Rs 50 crore with the concurrence of its financial advisor. It appears that a recent action of the DRDO, of approving a design and development project of Rs 49.82 crore for optical sensors to be used in unmanned aerial vehicles and airborne platforms without involving the Ministry, irked the authorities. So, the MOD has “clipped the wings” of the DRDO by re-imposing old controls.

This is a retrograde step engineered by the combined heavy hands of the entrenched babus in administration and accounts, blessed by an unenlightened and short-sighted political leadership. This flies in the face of various pronouncements of the Prime Minister during his various addresses to the scientific community.

In February 2012, Manmohan Singh in an interview to the Science magazine stated that “we need to do much more to change the face of science in India”.

I do not know if this is the change he wanted — imposing more rigorous accounting controls and stifling administrative procedures, so that DRDO becomes yet another run-of-the-mill government organisation.

Recently, the Prime Minister wanted Indian scientists “to seek newer frontiers of research, match capabilities of peers around the world and help India leapfrog”, even as one of his Cabinet ministers was busy belittling the scientific community under his watch.

COMPETENT AUTHORITY

From whatever can be gleaned from news reports, it appears that the recent decisions are based on a special audit conducted by the Controller General of Defence Accounts (CGDA) as ordered by the Minister. It is not clear as to how the CGDA can be considered competent to evaluate R&D activities. There are any number of forums to evaluate programmes and priorities, including peer group assessments, the Standing Committees and Consultative Committees of Parliament on defence.

Only a few years ago, we had the Rama Rao committee going into aspects of revamping defence research and development. So far, no one knows what the recommendations are, and how far these have been implemented.

Time and again, the government, particularly the MOD, tends to shoot itself in the foot by demoralising and insulting both military and civilian organisations under its fold.

(The author is former Member, Ordnance Factories)

(This article was published on October 1, 2012)

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The DRDO report card

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By Yatish Yadav and Nardeep Singh Dahiya 02nd September 2012 12:00 AM

CGDA secret audit blows the lid off several other projects

Nirbhay missile

Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE BANGALORE): In December 2010, a project for ‘additional development flight trials of Nirbhay’ was sanctioned costing Rs 18.1 crore . This was overlapping with an ongoing project codenamed Nirbhay sanctioned in 2004 at a cost of Rs 48 Crore.

“Old projects PDC has not been extended nor has it been successfully closed. The sanction of Rs 18.1 crore as a new project was inappropriate,” the audit said.
In one of its observation on the same project, the audit said “The case also raises questions on the way project proposals are put up for sanction. How original proposal to develop NIRBHAY exclude its trial? No research and development project can be sanctioned without inclusion of trial of the developed products.”
Arjun tank
Integrated Arjun tank program was sanctioned to CVRDE in November 2010 at a cost of Rs 69.90 crore. However, several small projects have been sanctioned under ‘buildup’. Audit reports reveal that it was done to avoid going through competent financial authority, which is contrary to financial regulations.
NAG missile
DRDO sanctioned another project at a cost of Rs 28.35 crore while cabinet committee on security approved programme to develop NAG missile is still going on.
UAV Aerostat project
It was sanctioned by DRDO at a cost of Rs 49.82 crore by reducing the cost proposed by the lab (Rs 70 crore) so as to bring it just under Rs 50 crore, which is its sanctioning power.
Facet
Facility for Electro-Optical System Testing (FACET) was sanctioned at a cost of Rs 35 crore by DG DRDO to create a facility, which is essentially required to meet the objectives of an already sanctioned project. However, the old project’s cost was not revised with the approval of appropriate CFA.
Flop show
Akash, NAG & Trishul missiles
The troika of integrated Guided Missile Development Plan (IGDMP) failed to fire after burning thousands of crore taxpayer’s money for almost 30 years. Akash which started in 1983 failed to meet requirements of army but after some hard bargaining Air force inducted it in its arsenal.
NAG, failed the 53rd test in August 2012. The project was started at an original cost of Rs 388.83 Crore in 1983, which was later revised to Rs 1,771.43 Crore. Indian army was forced to buy costly Javelin missile from USA in 2009 after DRDO failed to develop the project even after 29 years. After successive failures, Trishul was officially shelved in 2008. It is now reduced as a technology demonstrator by the DRDO.
AGNI
The AGNI project was launched in 1983. The DRDO borrowed ISRO’s PSLV rocket to enhance firepower after it failed the initial tests before 1994. AGNI series of Missiles AGNI I and AGNI II with a range of 700 km and 2,500 km were inducted in the armed forces after successful tests. AGNI III with a range of 3,500 km is expected to be inducted in the army soon.
Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence in its report in March 2012 observed that the maximum range of the missiles that have been handed over to the army is 25 km only. Government in its reply to the committee had stated that the Indian army is currently in the process of procurement of advanced long range missile system and upgradation of certain existing weapon platform.
LCA
The LCA project, launched in 1983,is still waiting for final flight. The DRDO failed to develop promised indigenous engine even after spending over Rs 17,000 crore. It is expected to achieve the lasted deadline by December 2013.
Consider the three biggest projects: developing a Main Battle Tank (MBT), a nuclear-powered submarine, and an advanced Light Combat Aircraft (LCA). The MBT project was launched in 1974. But the tank has failed to meet service-requirement tests. It is reportedly too heavy and undependable to be used in combat. The Indian Army prefers Russian tanks and says it will use MBTs for training, not operations. The nuclear submarine project, launched 31 years ago, is not yet finished despite an estimated Rs 3,000 crore spent on it. The reactor is apparently ready, but not tested with the vessel’s hull.
Kaveri Engine
The CAG in its annual report 2010-11 noted that government had already spent Rs 1,892 crore on Kaveri Engine development programme launched in 1986 to power the Light Combat Aircraft, Tejas. In 2005, the GTRE had indicated that it would not be able to develop the Kaveri engine on its own. Defence Minister AK Antony has told Parliament that the DRDO still has no time-frame to fully develop its Kaveri engine. He also said that the engine will be used in UAVs and marine applications.

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DRDO’s Nag missile fails in user trials

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New Delhi: The long-delayed Nag anti-tank missile project of the DRDO has suffered yet another setback as its user trials held recently failed.

In the trials held in Rajasthan in presence of senior Lt Gen-rank officers from the Army and top DRDO officials, the modified carrier of the missile called NAMICA also under-performed, DRDO sources told a news agency here.

In the trials held at the Mahajan firing range, four Nag missiles were fired of which only one could hit the target whereas the remaining failed to do so due to glitches in the equipment on-board the weapon, they said.

Army officials present at the test-firings were not happy with the performance of the missile and have asked the defence research agency to come better prepared for the trials to be held in the future, they said.

The missile has been under development as part of the Integrated Guided Missile Development Program (IGMDP) initiated in early 1980s and is now expected to take few more years to reach the induction stage.

Sources said the carrier of the Nag missile called NAMICA — a modified Russian-origin BMP-II personnel carrier, also failed to satisfy the users in displaying its capabilities in water during the trials.

However, the NAMICA met the requirements of the user in terms of its cross-country capabilities, they said.

When contacted for his reaction, DRDO spokesperson Ravi Gupta said the trials were a “partial success”.

“The Advanced Target Acquisition systems with both the Gunner and Commander have performed well,” he claimed.

The spokesperson said these trials have “brought out certain deviations in the engine performance of the NAMICA BMP-II and those were being assessed by the experts.”

So far, DRDO has carried out more than 50 test-launches of the missile since it started its development in the 80s.

The DRDO is also working on developing the helicopter-launched Nag missile called the HELINA and its trials are also expected to be held soon.

The Indian Army has been awaiting the induction of the Nag missile for a long time now. In absence of any indigenous system, it uses the French-origin Milan anti-tank missiles and is also in negotiations with the US for procuring a significant number of Javelin anti-tank guided missiles.

PTI

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India’s first aerostat radar launched

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Indo-Asian News Service | Updated: December 28, 2010 18:47 IST

Agra: India’s first indigenously-developed balloon-mounted radar that will greatly enhance the surveillance capabilities of the armed forces has been successfully launched.

The aerostat radar was launched from a military compound and will remain at a height of about one kilometre for the next two or three days. All its systems are working satisfactorily, Sudhir Gupta, the project director said.

The helium-filled aerostat has night vision cameras and sound recorders, weighs around 300 kg, and can be reused.

Gupta said the aerostat can survey areas upto 20 km away and with advanced cameras, its range can go beyond 100 km.

At the initiative of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the Agra based Aerial Delivery Research Development Establishment designed and fabricated the high-tech platform.

The aerostat will be used for communication and surveillance. The platform integrates high-end technology, aerodynamics, balloon techniques, hydraulics and high-pressure cylinder technology, according to the scientists involved in the project.

The Indian army and air force hitherto rely on Israeli aerostats that are deployed along the country’s western borders but the Indian version would be a cheaper option. They supplement the efforts of the air force’s airborne warning and control systems (AWACS) that fly at a much greater height.

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Tatra truck deal: Antony faces jail for neglect of duty?

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Manoj Mitta, TNN Apr 1, 2012, 06.13AM IST

NEW DELHI: Defence minister A K Antony had better come up with a “reasonable excuse” for waking up to corruption allegations in the Tatra deal two years after they had been brought to his notice. For, he would otherwise be liable for a criminal offence punishable with imprisonment up to six months.

The belated registration on Friday of a CBI case related to Tatra indicates Antony violated a legal duty when the bribery allegations had first been brought to his notice in writing by his party colleague Ghulam Nabi Azad in 2009 and then verbally by Army chief Gen V K Singh in 2010.

His prolonged failure to take action on the issue till it came out in the open flies in the face of the duty cast on “every person” by Section 39 of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC).

When anybody becomes “aware of the commission of or of the intention of any other person to commit” any of the range of offences listed in Section 39 CrPC, he “shall … forthwith give information” to the nearest magistrate or police officer of “such commission or intention”.

The offences which every person is thus required to report immediately include those related to “illegal gratification”, which come under the Prevention of Corruption Act.

Violations of Section 39 CrPC are punishable under Section 176 of the IPC, which prescribes a maximum six months is jail. It penalizes whoever is “legally bound” to give any information relating to “the commission of an offence or… for the purpose of preventing the commission of an offence”.

The only loophole available to Antony is to cite some “reasonable excuse” for his failure to refer the Tatra issue immediately to the CBI. But then, Section 39 CrPC is so stringently worded that it casts a “burden” on the person concerned to prove the reasonableness of his excuse for not performing his duty.

It is doubtful whether Antony can cite the absence of written complaint by Singh as a “reasonable excuse” for not acting promptly. The Army chief, too, is liable under Section 39 CrPC for assuming he can leave it to Antony to initiate the legal process. Since the law requires him to report the matter, he cannot cite his communication to his superior as a “reasonable excuse”.