Indian Military

New Delhi– India’s ‘Nishant’ Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) is finally ready for the Indian Army after a series of successful flight trials in Rajasthan recently. The Indian Army has taken the delivery of four Nishant UAV’s with ground systems and expects to order more in the near future.

The Nishant UAV has been indigenously designed and developed by the Defence Research & Development Organisation’s (DRDO) Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) laboratory. ADE specialises in UAVs, flight control systems and simulators.

The Nishant UAV will give a decisive edge to the Indian Army in the area of day and night battle-field reconnaissance, surveillance, target tracking and correction of artillery fire. The UAV can also be used for anti-insurgency operations in critical times. The electro-optical, electronic intelligence and communication intelligence payload on-board the Nishant UAV will enable it for an array of operations such as the above-mentioned ones. The Nishant UAV does not need a runway and can be launched from a hydro pneumatic launcher.

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There’s no telling what hobbies can turn into, for obsessed-enough people. Apple’s Steve Jobs often refers to some of his company’s lower key projects as hobbies, which seem to be part technology-demonstrators, part proofs-of-concept and all meant to answer a what-would-happen-if technological inquiry, with the idea that if you build it, maybe they will come.

Augmented reality, now available on many smartphones, is a way of instantly contextualizing visual inputs, with sound or graphics. The idea being, holding up your cellphone camera up against a building, storefront or maybe even person and getting more information thrown up for it, listed on the internet.

Fabien Blanc-Paques in his lab.

Imagine the potential for military applications of something like this. And then put it on a UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle). This is what a French hobbyist has done, enabling the augmentation of the live video feed from a UAV with realtime onboard data like position, altitude, navigation data, battery-usage and voltage, current temperature etc.

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The Indian Defense Minister AK Antony, on Monday, agreed to provide three aircraft to Seychelles on its request. An Indian Ministry of Defense statement said, “On a specific request from the Seychelles, Mr. Antony agreed to provide one new Dornier and two Chetak helicopters from the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited for maritime surveillance, at the earliest.” The statement quoted him as saying that although delivery would normally take 18 to 24 months, New Delhi would try to provide the aircraft in 15 months. In the meantime, India is to provide an in-service Dornier Aircraft to carry out maritime surveillance. This comes after Indian Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh committed $ 5 million assistance to Seychelles for defense-related projects during the visit of Seychellois President James Alix Michel to India earlier.

Antony met President Michel, Vice President Danny Faure, the Minister for Home Affairs Joel Morgan and Foreign Minister Jean Paul Adam in Mahe, while leading a delegation comprising Defense Secretary Pradeep Kumar and the Vice Chief of Naval Staff Vice Admiral DK Dewan.

New Delhi – Jubilant Bhartia Group, a renowned diversified Indian conglomerate, has signalled its entry into the defence sector by announcing its plans to manufacture unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in India.

Jubilant Bhartia has set up Jubilant Aeronautics (JAPL), a joint venture wherein Israel’s leading defence corporation called Aeronautics will pick up a 26% stake and produce UAVs. The new venture will be based in Bangalore and will manufacture UAVs for defence and civil purposes besides looking after the integration, maintenance, repair and overhaul of UAVs as well.

The current joint venture has been forwarded to the foreign investment promotion board (FIPB) seeking its clearance to the equity investment by Israel’s Aeronautics. The creation of this joint venture will enable India to have powerful UAVs made indigenously, an area where India lacks superior technology. The UAVs made by Jubilant Aeronautics will assist India’s homeland security as well as the monitoring of oil and gas pipelines, weather forecasting and traffic monitoring and disaster management among others.

New Delhi — In a first of its kind move, the state-owned Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has decided to include the private sector for the ‘Rustom’ Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) project.

The Rustom UAV project is spearheaded by the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE), part of the DRDO and the private aeronautical firm Taneja Aerospace & Aviation has been selected for the development of advanced critical system technologies pertaining to the ‘Rustom’ UAV.

The Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) have been significantly contributing to the ‘Rustom’ UAV and private firm Taneja Aersoapce & Aviation has already contributed to the prototype of the ‘Rustom’ UAV which is slated to fly in October. The areas wherein the private sector firm will contribute includes airframes and avionics. The ADE has just done the design and integration in the ‘Rustom’ UAV and other technologies and equipment have been outsourced through private firms.

The ‘Rustom’ UAV prototype can fly at an altitude of 25,000 feet for 12-15 hours at a speed of 180 kilometres per hour.

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Minister of State for Defense Mallipudi Mangapati Pallam Raju, Minister of Communication and Information Technology Andimuthu Raja, Defense Minister Arackaparambil Kurian Antony, Air Chief Marshal Pradeep Vasant Naik and Minister of State for Communications Sachin Pilot.

The gigabyte digital information grid of the Indian Air Force (IAF), AFNET (Air Force Network) went live after Defense Minister Arackaparambil Kurian Antony inaugurated it in New Delhi on Tuesday.

A demonstration of the capabilities of the network was conducted with ‘a practice interception of simulated enemy targets by a pair of MiG-29 fighter aircraft airborne from an advanced airbase in the Punjab sector, neutralizing intruding targets in the western sector’, according to a statement issued by the IAF.

Network Centric Warfare ability was also demonstrated with video feed generation from Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and pictures from an AWACS aircraft.

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The Indian Air Force (IAF) began trials for the AH-64D Apache Longbow attack helicopter last week. IAF sources confirmed that the aircraft, which is competing with the Russian Mi-28 for the IAF’s tender for 22 attack helicopters, has already completed trials in Jaisalmer and is currently undergoing high altitude, flight and maneuverability demonstrations at Leh.

The trials are expected to continue till the end of next week, after which the Mi-28 is expected to be given a similar once-over. The maintenance and weapons trials of the former will be conducted in the United States in the coming weeks.

Features of the AH-64D Apache Longbow. Source: Boeing

Dean Millsap of Boeing Rotorcraft Systems, told visiting Indian media in Philadelphia in May that the company had crash-tested the aircraft to a drop-speed of 40 feet per second. The company is pitching its ballistically-tolerant structure, which can withstand an impact up to 23 millimeters, to emphasize the survivablility of the aircraft.