India will launch Agni VI next, says DRDO chief
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The Defence Research Development Organisation is preparing the roadmap to 2050. The Agni V was just the beginning, and work is already in progress for the advanced version — the Agni VI — a multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle (MIRV). This was disclosed by Dr Vijay Kumar Saraswat, director-general of DRDO, secretary of the department of defence R&D and scientific adviser to the defence minister, on the sidelines of a felicitation ceremony organised by FAPCCI CEO Forum in Hyderabad on Saturday.
Still basking in the glory of the intercontinental range ballistic missile, the Agni V, Dr Saraswat dismissed the accusations of Army chief General V.K. Singh regarding corruption or commissions in arms deals, asserting that the procedure laid down for finalising the arms deals left little scope for corruption.
On the light combat aircraft (LCA), Dr Saraswat said that the LCA Mk-1 would be ready next year, while the Mk-2 would be completed by 2016 and the LCA Navy by 2014. He added that work had been going on simultaneously for all these aircraft versions.
Reflecting on two decades taken for completing the LCA, Dr Saraswat said that the carbon fibre was not indigenously available in India, and that even the USA took 22 years to develop its stealth aircraft. Following the denial of material and technology from countries like the USA, the indigenously developed Agni V took three years from drawing board to launch pad. DRDO officials claim that another ICBM, a three-stage Agni VI missile, will be developed in another two years or so and will have an even longer range, up to 8,000 km to 10,000 km. The Agni VI will be sleeker than the Agni-V and capable of carrying at least 10 nuclear warheads, capable of targeting multiple targets at the same time.
The thrust will be once again on procuring the sub-systems from Indian industrial units, and a significant chunk of these will be from Hyderabad. The DRDO chief asked the industry to join forces with it in its various programmes till 2020 for projects worth more than Rs 3 lakh crore.
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