India's missile complex in Hyderabad, which has a cluster to top class laboratories and institutes will aptly bear the name of APJ Abdul Kalam from October 15, the birthday of the former President and "Missile man".
The Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar will hold the formal function on Thursday at the Research Centre Imarat tomorrow on the occasion of the 84th birth anniversary of Kalam, who passed away in July this year.
Kalam had joined the Missile Complex, DRDO in 1982 and was a part of it for nearly two decades. He steered the mega, Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme (IGMDP) from here. It brought into its fold nearly 250 industries, public sector and private in collaborative and contract work to fabricate critical systems and parts to the end production of different missiles.
The Missile Complex comprises Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL), Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) and Research Centre Imarat (RCI) which is considered to be the brain child of Kalam. As its founder director, he conceived and steered RCI as a generator of critical missile technologies.
Parrikar will also be inaugurating two advanced R&D facilities of RCI - Outdoor RCS Test Facility, “ORANGE”, at Dundigal and Kautilya Advanced Research Centre at RCI, Hyderabad. G. Satheesh Reddy, SA to RM & Director, RCI along with other Distinguished Scientists, Lab Directors, Project Directors, senior officials & Staff of DRDO will be present during the event, an official release said.
In addition to the defence research institutes focussed on missiles, Hyderabad also houses the missile production industry--Bharat Dynamics Limited. It also has a major facility associated with BrahMos, the Indo-Russian joint venture company which produces the supersonic cruise missile. There are also quality certification and instrumentation centres that support the ambitious missile programme of the country.
The DRDO has been successful in developing and supplying Agni-the long distance, inter-continental, surface to surface missile; Prithvi, the 350 km range surface to air missile in different versions to the armed forces. The premier defence research organisation has also developed Akash, Nag, Dhanush etc which are at different stages of trials and production.
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