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Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully flight tested the second indigenously developed ‘Solid Fuel Ducted Ramjet (SFDR)’ propulsion based missile system from ITR, Chandipur, Odisha today. Ground booster, separation of ground booster and Nozzle-less-booster performance were found satisfactory. Missile was guided to high altitude to simulate aircraft release conditions and subsequently nozzle-less-booster was ignited. SFDR based missile accelerated to achieve ramjet Mach number successfully. The trajectory was tracked by telemetry and radar stations till touchdown.

The intent of the government at the Centre has been very clear – to aggressively indigenise the Indian defence industrial sector. But from ‘intent’ to ‘delivery’ there is a huge mismatch, primarily because the bureaucracy has been playing spoilsport.

The military is undoubtedly a powerful instrument of state policy for securing vital national interests. Military diplomacy is symbolic of strategic signaling and ability of a nation to use the military as a tool of national power.  Joint military training, multinational exercises, port calls by naval ships, military to military dialogues, imparting training and cross-attachment of military personals is part of military diplomacy and military to military engagement.

Union Government, on February 1, in its budget for the current financial year 2019-20, has allocated over Rs 3, 18, 000 crore for the defence needs excluding the defence pension. This is for the first time that the allocation for the defence has exceeded three lakh crore mark.

Four days after the crash of Jaguar aircraft, Indian Air Force (IAF) lost an upgraded Mirage 2000 multi-role fighter during an acceptance sortie in Bengaluru killing its two pilot crew. "HAL regrets to inform that one upgraded Mirage 2000 aircraft crashed during the customer acceptance flight at HAL airport here today around 10.30 am resulting in loss of lives of two pilots Sqn Ldr Sameer Abrol and Sqn Ldr Siddartha Negi," Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) said in a statement. 

The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), in a landmark decision today, also approved indigenous construction of six submarines for the Indian Navy at a cost of over Rs. 40,000 crores. This is the second project under the MoD’s ambitious Strategic Partnership (SP) model that aims at providing a significant fillip to the Government’s ‘Make in India’ programme. SP model envisages indigenous manufacturing of major defence platforms by an Indian Strategic Partner, who will collaborate with foreign OEM to set up production facilities in the country.