The country’s first indigenous subsonic cruise missile, Nirbhay (Fearless), will be ready early next year.
“The integration of the engine is under way. All processes are on for the sub-sonic medium-range cruise missile,” said Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) chief VK Saraswat at the air show.
The missile with a range of 1,000km can be launched from multiple launchers. It will arm all the three services. Nirbhay is expected to supplement the BrahMos cruise missile, which has a range of 300km.
About the hypersonic cruise missile, a more advanced version of the BrahMos, Dr Saraswat said it also would be ready by 2012. A successful test of the technology of the missile was carried out in a laboratory in May 2008 at a speed of 6.5 Mach. The hypersonic demonstrator vehicle will attain a level flight, for a ground-to-ground test, at a height of 30 km from the ground, before it hits the target with a speed between seven and eight Mach.
The hypersonic missile BrahMos-2 will be the Mach 8 version of the missile. It will be the country’s first hypersonic cruise missile. It is an advanced version of the present air-launched missile.
DRDO and NPO-Mash are working on a sustained flight scramjet, which will be the core element in the Mark-2 version of BrahMos.
About the ballistic missile defence shield, Dr Saraswat said that the next advanced air defence test (AAD) will take place this month.
The ballistic missile defence shield test had failed on March 15, 2010 but was test-fired successfully later.
The exo-atmospheric interceptor missile, called PAD (Prithvi Air Defence), will now be called PDV (Prithvi Defence Vehicle), and will intercept at 150km altitude compared to the earlier 50km range.
“All elements of aerospace are within our grip and India would soon be an aerospace power,” Saraswat said.
The nuclear-capable strategic Agni-V, with a range of 5,000km, will be tested by the end of this year. The software and hardware of the missile are in the integration stage.
