India successfully tested an anti-submarine weapon system developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) on Monday, in a boost to its naval warfare capabilities.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh congratulated the DRDO scientists for the feat. He said, "The DRDO has successfully flight tested the Supersonic Missile assisted release of Torpedo, SMART. This will be a major technology breakthrough for stand-off capability in anti-submarine warfare. I congratulate DRDO and other stakeholders for this significant achievement."

DRDO chairman G. Satheesh Reddy said that SMART is a game changer technology demonstration in Anti-Submarine Warfare.

The DRDO said that "supersonic missile-assisted release of torpedo (SMART) has been successfully flight tested at 11:45 hrs from Wheeler Island off the coast of Odisha. "All the mission objectives including missile flight up to the range and altitude, separation of the nose cone, release of Torpedo and deployment of Velocity Reduction Mechanism (VRM) have been met perfectly," DRDO said in a statement.

It also stated that the tracking stations -- Radars, Electro Optical Systems -- along the coast and the telemetry stations including down range ships monitored all the events.

It is a missile-assisted release of lightweight anti-submarine torpedo system for anti-submarine warfare operations far beyond torpedo range. This launch and demonstration is significant in establishing anti-submarine warfare capabilities.

A number of DRDO laboratories including Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL), Research Centre Imarat in Hyderabad, Aerial Delivery Research and Development Establishment, Agra, Naval Science and Technological Laboratory (NSTL) Visakhapatnam have developed the technologies required for SMART.
(IANS)