On April 21, 2023, an official from Solar Industries in Nagpur said that the organisation has bagged an order to supply Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (Nagastra-1) to the Indian Army by beating competitors from Poland and Israel.
The drone is a creation of a collaboration between Economic Explosives Limited (a hundred per cent subsidiary of Solar Industries, Nagpur) and a Bengaluru-based firm called Z-Motion. This is a government initiative to bring Atmanirbharta into ammunition and defence systems.
According to an official, “Solar Industries have taken initiatives to develop a wide array of weaponised drones to neutralise the targets using gravity bombs, guided missiles and in a Kamikaze Mode. This will significantly boost indigenous capabilities of using drones and UAVs as war machinery.”
The company said that Nagastra-1 having more than 75 per cent indigenous content, also possesses certain world-class features.
In the Kamikaze mode, it can neutralise any hostile threat with GPS-enabled precision strikes with an accuracy of 2 meters. The fixed-wing electric UAV has an endurance of one hour (60 min) with a man-in-loop range of 15km and an autonomous mode range of 30km.
In addition to the day-night surveillance cameras, the loitering munition is equipped with a fragmenting warhead to defeat soft-skin targets.
In a case where the target is not detected or the mission is aborted, the loitering munition can be called back and can do a soft landing with a parachute recovery mechanism enabling it to be reused multiple times. It further said that this loitering munition’s abort, recover and reuse features make it superior to similar class of drones used by advanced nations.
In the Indian Context, the recent incidents along the borders have seen a noticeable increase in drone-related incidents along the northern borders.
Drone technology has proved to be a force multiplier in military operations, as evident from its application in various recent conflicts such as the Armenia-Azerbaijan War, Syria, the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the strike on the oilfields of Saudi Arabia.
A model of Nagastra-1 loitering munition was recently displayed at the Army Commanders Conference held in New Delhi.
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