stature, sitting in the all-powerful South Block, be
concerned about a wedding which was to take place on a
far-flung island in a small house on Mosque Street?
I have always had a high regard for Dr Arunachalam. He
has together with a command over language as he
displayed on this occasion, an uncanny presence of mind. I
was overwhelmed when the Defence Minister located an
Air Force helicopter doing sorties between Madras and
Madurai later in the day to take me to Madurai as soon as I
disembarked at Madras from the regular Indian Airlines
flight, which was leaving Delhi in an hour’s time. Dr
Arunachalam told me, “You have earned this for your hard
work of the last six months.”
Flying towards Madras, I scribbled on the back of my
boarding pass:
Who never climbed the weary league –
Can such a foot explore
The purple territories
On Rameswaram’s shore?
The Air Force helicopter landed close to the Indian
Airlines aircraft as soon as it arrived from Delhi. Within the
next few minutes I was on my way to Madurai. The Air
Force commandant there was kind enough to take me to
the railway station, where the train to Rameswaram was
just about to roll out of the platform. I was in Rameswaram
well in time for Zameela’s wedding. I blessed my brother’s
daughter with a father’s love.
The Defence Minister put up our proposal before the
Cabinet and saw it through. His recommendations on our
proposal were accepted and an unprecedented amount of
Rs 388 crores was sanctioned for this purpose. Thus was
born India’s prestigious Integrated Guided Missile
Development Programme, later abbreviated to IGMDP.
When I presented the government sanction letter before
the Missile Technology Committee at DRDL, they were
enthused with fire and action. The proposed projects were
christened in accordance with the spirit of India’s self-
reliance. Thus the Surface-to-Surface weapon system
became Prithvi (“the Earth”) and the Tactical Core Vehicle
was called Trishul (the trident of Lord Shiva). The Surface-
to-Air area defence system was named as Akash (“sky”)
and the anti-tank missile project Nag (“Cobra”). I gave the
name Agni (“Fire”) to my long cherished dream of REX. Dr
Arunachalam came to DRDL and formally launched the
IGMDP on 27 July 1983. It was a great event in which every
single employee of DRDL participated. Everybody who
was somebody in Indian Aerospace Research was invited.
A large number of scientists from other laboratories and
organizations, professors from academic institutions,
representatives of the armed forces, production centres,
and inspection authorities, who were our business partners
now, were present on this occasion. A closed-circuit TV
network had to be pressed into operation to ensure proper
communication between the participants for we had no
single place to accommodate all the invitees. This was the
second most significant day in my career, next only to 18
July 1980, when the SLV -3 had launched Rohini into the
earth’s orbit.
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