Mission Shakti chief takes aim with ‘smaller, but lethally accurate’ weapons for the future

SOURCE: HT

The evolution of warfare was laid out for science enthusiasts, with U Raja Babu, project director, Mission Shakti, DRDO, Hyderabad, insisting that “smaller, but lethally accurate” is the way forward. Babu was speaking on ‘Technological Challenges – Missile and Space Defence’, at the CSIR National Chemical Laboratory (NCL) on the occasion of National Science Day on Friday.

Babu, who comes from a defence background, laid out his view of what the future holds. “The future will be of nature-centric warfare and information warfare. Constantly, new technologies are coming out. Today, smaller ones but targeted weapons are needed. From tactical systems we are working on network-centric system. Improvement is coming in accuracy of weapons.”

“Kinetic energy is the future concept for weapons. Challenges are to achieve a low miss, or direct hit, at conditions of high closing velocity and low homing duration.

“We need faster autopilots, accurate estimators and advanced guidance subsystems to lethally enhance or neutralise a payload. Space security is another important future challenge and I look forward to you all students as working in this field,” Babu said.

Babu called for students to pursue challenging careers to take India ahead.

“Mission Shakti is not just a mission, but a message to the nation and to the outside world that India is no longer a developing country and a developed country,” Babu said, adding, “We have the technical capabilities to do major projects. When we got the go ahead by PM Modi to do this mission (Shakti) in 2016, within two years our scientists worked round the clock and executed the mission. It was very challenging for us and I look forward to all Science students working on such missions or projects in the future” Babu said.

Mission Shakti is India’s anti-satellite weapon system, developed at DRDO, and headed by Babu..

Ashwini Kumar Nangia, director of CSIR NCL, talking on the occasion said, “This is the 70th year of NCL and we will be displaying the history of the NCL through a permanent exhibition inside the campus. Research scholars of NCL will make movies on NCL’s work. In the next two months we will open the exhibition room here on the campus.”

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