NEW DELHI: Amid the West Asia conflict offering hard lessons on air defence and drone warfare and with Defence Minister Rajnath Singh urging the military to internalise them, the Indian Army has been conducting intensive exercises across its field commands to sharpen its edge in both domains.
Army chief Gen Upendra Dwivedi on Saturday witnessed the annual Integrated Air Defence Firepower exercise at the Army Air Defence College, Gopalpur. The Additional Directorate General of Public Information said in a statement that the exercise “showcased seamless synergy of multifarious air defence weapon systems operating in a networked environment, effectively validating the detection-to-engagement cycle against new-age hybrid aerial threats.”
Visuals from the exercise captured the Indo-Israeli MRSAM, DRDO’s D4 counter-UAS system, the Zu-23 and L-70 anti-aircraft guns and the radar-guided self-propelled Schilka. Decoys were also present to simulate hostile aerial targets and test the performance of integrated air defence systems under realistic conditions.
“The thrust was not on individual platforms but on how they operate as an integrated network for faster detection and engagement of targets across ranges and altitudes,” a source explained.
On the same day, Northern Army Commander Lt Gen Pratik Sharma, speaking in Udhampur, underlined both the enduring primacy of ground dominance and the accelerating technological transformation of the battlefield.
“Decisive victory rests on ground dominance. Warfare has broadened with society, industry and technology now aligning with diplomacy, deterrence, force and political will,” he said, adding that “drones, decision weapons, electronic warfare and counter-systems are reshaping combat.”
Separately, Western Command, holding operational responsibility along the Pakistan front, on Sunday showcased elements of its II Strike Corps conducting a 72-hour intensive reconnaissance exercise.
Mechanised recce troops, equipped with UAVs and advanced surveillance systems rehearsed the pre-assault phase ahead of armoured thrusts. Such troops push ahead of the main force to develop the battlespace picture, map enemy positions and guide armour to exploit gaps.
Earlier this month, Southern Command conducted the fortnight-long ‘Amogh Jwala’ exercise, fielding the Army’s first dedicated ‘Shaurya’ squadron. The Army is currently working to raise such squadrons across its Armoured Corps to embed UAV-led surveillance and precision strike capability directly into mechanised operations, with at least one squadron earmarked for each of the six operational commands in the initial phase, followed by progressive induction across all 63 armoured regiments.
The broader institutionalisation of unmanned systems is now cutting across all combat arms. In the infantry, ‘Ashni’ platoons raised last year are equipped with surveillance UAVs and loitering munitions for tactical ISR and strike.
Meanwhile, in the artillery, ‘Divyastra’ batteries built under a 'save and raise' model have integrated UAV-based targeting with conventional guns to compress engagement timelines. Dedicated ‘Shaktibaan’ regiments have also been raised in the artillery for long-range precision strikes using swarm drones, RPAS (remotely piloted aircraft systems) and loitering munitions.