• Investment World
• eWorld
• Brand Line
• Mentor
• Life
• Brand Quest
• The New Manager

Stocks

• Quotes
• SE Diary
• Scoreboard
• Open-End Mutual Fund

Cross Currency

• Rates
  
  

Shipping

• Ports
  
  

Archives

• Yesterday
• Datewise
• Resources
• In Focus
• In Depth
• Events 2007

Group Sites

• The Hindu
• The Hindu ePaper
• Business Line
• Business Line ePaper
• Sportstar
• Frontline
• The Hindu eBooks
• The Hindu Images

— H. Satish

Dr R. Sreehari Rao, Director, DLRL, with the newly developed hi-tech jammers for VVIP convoys at DLRL in Hyderabad.

M. Somasekhar

Hyderabad, Feb. 22 Electronic Warfare (EW) systems to be fitted on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), Aerostats and Satellites, to gather critical information that would be important in future wars, is the focus area for the Defence Electronics Research Laboratory (DLRL).

Hyderabad-based DLRL — the country’s top electronics facility supporting the defence research sector — has firmed up projects to be implemented over the next three years, according to its Director, Dr R. Sreehari Rao.

With a combination of radars, receivers and jammers in miniaturised mode, the EW system would be on board these platforms. The UAVs — Rustam and Gagan — which can fly a medium altitude, and being developed by the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) at Bangalore, would be fitted with these systems. Similarly, Aerostats, which are typically balloons, offer a cost effective platform and fly in low ranges, while satellites would be the high altitude platforms, which the EW systems could be deployed on, Dr Sreehari Rao told Business Line in an interview.

The DLRL, which has drawn the support of several public and private sector industries in the recent past, has delivered over a 100 systems to the defence forces. These include antennas, receivers, jammers, radar fingerprinting identification systems etc, he said.

One of the major contributions of the DLRL, a constituent lab under the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO), is project ‘Sangraha’, under which EW systems for deployment on helicopters, aircraft and submarines has been developed, Dr Sreehari Rao said. The Navy, which is the main user and also co-developer, has placed a repeat and bigger order for these EW systems, after being satisfied by the development and first-phase products.

While DRDO has spent Rs 56.87 crore for the development through DLRL, it has generated a production value of Rs 1,695 crore, he explained.

The main production agency, BEL, Hyderabad has manufactured and supplied about 38 systems. Five types of EW systems, namely Kite, Eagle and Home for airborne platforms and Porpoise for submarine and Ellora for large ships of the Indian Navy have been developed and inducted under the project ‘Sangraha’, Dr Rao said.

In the civilian applications, a major spin-off has been the jamming system for VVIP protection. The vehicle-mounted system can effectively neutralise cell phones, Improvised Explosive Devicesetc, for up to 100 metres, and are being sought by various agencies.

It is an offshoot of the Convoy Protection system that DLRL developed for the army and paramilitary forces for use in insurgency and terrorist prone areas.

The Army has taken 360 systems — manufactured by BEL — and has fitted them into Tata Sumo vehicles.

A miniaturised version of the system, which can be fitted into a large suitcase, has also been developed recently and is currently undergoing trials.

More Stories on : Security | Science & Technology

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Thirteenth Finance Commission — Unlikely to break new ground

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu Business Line