According to information published by the Indian Ministry of Defense on August 4, 2022, Indian-made Laser-Guided Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGM) were successfully test-fired from the Main Battle Tank (MBT) Arjun by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Army at KK Ranges with support of Armoured Corps Centre & School (ACC&S) Ahmednagar in Maharashtra.
The missiles hit with precision and successfully destroyed the targets at two different ranges. Telemetry systems have recorded the satisfactory flight performance of the missiles.
The all-indigenous Laser Guided ATGM employs a tandem High Explosive Anti-Tank (HEAT) warhead to defeat Explosive Reactive Armour (ERA) protected armored vehicles. The ATGM has been developed with multi-platform launch capability and is currently undergoing technical evaluation trials from the 120 mm rifled gun of MBT Arjun.
Raksha Mantri Shri Rajnath Singh has complimented DRDO and the Indian Army for the successful performance of the Laser Guided ATGMs. Secretary, Department of Defence R&D and Chairman DRDO Dr G Satheesh Reddy congratulated the teams associated with the test firing of Laser Guided ATGMs.
The design of the first generation of Arjun tank started in 1986 and was finalized in 1996. It entered into service with the Indian army in 2004. In 2010, the DRDO proposed an improved variant of the Arjun designated as the Arjun MK2 as the next step in the program.
The main armament of the Arjun tank consists of a 120 mm rifled gun fitted with an ARDE-developed (Armament Research and Development Establishment) recoil system, muzzle reference system, and fume extractor, which can fire a variety of guided or unguided anti-armor munitions.
The Arjun MK1 is capable of firing several types of munitions, including an indigenously developed armor-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS) round and a dual-purpose high explosive squash head (HESH) round. The Arjun MK1 can carry a mix of 42 APFSDS and HESH rounds in blast-proof canisters with blow-out panels. In 2017, the Mark 2 variant of the APFSDS with a long rod tungsten alloy penetrator was developed and successfully tested by ARDE for the new Alpha variant of the Arjun MK1A.
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