Indian Army To Induct More Pinaka Rocket Launchers To Boost Firepower
The Indian Army, which currently operates two regiments of the indigenously-developed truck-mounted Pinaka multi-barrel rocket launcher systems, hopes to induct another eight by 2022 and is looking at increasing the number to 22 within a decade to add firepower to its artillery, an official said.
The Pinaka system is designed and developed by two private entities, the Tatas and Larsen and Toubro (L&T), in association with Armament Research and Development Establishment of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). It is one of the rare successes of the private sector in manufacturing military hardware.
Jayant D Patil, Senior Vice President & Head - Defence & Aerospace, L&T, told IANS:
The first two Pinaka regiments were inducted during 2006-2010. L&T, which supplied the systems for one regiment, has been supporting them on an as-needed basis. The user (Indian Army) has plans for induction of 22 regiments overall and this is likely to be in a time frame of a decade-plus.
The Cabinet Committe on Security in September cleared the raising of the third and fourth Pinaka regiments at a cost of over Rs 3,000 crore ($441 million). And the Defence Acquisition Council last month cleared a RFP (Request for Proposal) for six additional regiments at a cost of Rs 14,633 crore.
Each regiment consists of three batteries of six Pinaka launchers, each capable of launching 12 rockets with a range of 40km in a space of 44 seconds, in addition to support vehicles, a radar and a command post. The rockets in the 12 additional regiments will have an extended range of 70km and are currently in the development process.
With inputs from IANS