BrahMos Aerospace proposes modern facility at Lucknow

• BrahMos Aerospace which produce BrahMos Missile system, has proposed to set up a state-of-the-art production facility in Lucknow will be part of the Uttar Pradesh Defence Industrial Corridor.
• BrahMos Aerospace, a joint venture (JV) of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) of India and NPO Mashinostroeyenia (NPOM) of Russia,
• The establishment of BrahMos Aerospace will make Uttar Pradesh an aerospace and defence hub of India.

BrahMos Missile:

• It is a supersonic cruise missile.
• BrahMos is a two-stage missile with solid propellant booster as first stage and liquid ramjet as the second stage.
• BrahMos was named after two major rivers of India and Russia: Brahmaputra and Moskva.
• It is developed in joint venture between the Defence Research and Development Organisation of India (DRDO) and the NPOM of Russia.
• It is capable of being launched from land, sea, sub-sea and air against surface and sea-based targets.
• One of the fastest cruise missile in the world with speed of Mach 2.8, which is 3 times more than the speed of sound.
• Its range was initially capped at 290 km, but India’s entry into the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), the range has been extended to 450 km.
• Advanced versions of range above 1,000 kilometers and speed upto 5 Mach are said to be under development.
• BrahMos were inducted into service by the Indian Navy in 2005 and the Indian Army in 2007.
• It was succesfully tested in Su-30MKI in 2017.

Defence Industrial Corridor

• A defence corridor refers to a route or a path along which domestic productions of defence equipment by public sector, private sector and MSMEs are lined up to enhance the operational capability of the defence forces.
• The Government has set up defence industrial corridors in Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
• The establishment of the DICs aims at providing fillip to the defence manufacturing ecosystem through synergistic development of technologies, promote growth of private domestic manufacturers, including MSMEs and Start-Ups.
• The production of armament/ammunition; components of aerospace industries; missile systems; and establishment of research & development facilities has been envisaged in the two DICs.
• According to data released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), India topped the list of arms importer accounting for 13% of the trade in weapons platform between 2012-2018.
• The corridors overlap with existing defence public sector companies, and aim to ensure connectivity among various defence industrial units.
• At present, both DICs are in their formative stages.