Defence Ministry Places Order For 114 Dhanush Artillery Guns

New Delhi, February 19: The Ministry of Defence on Tuesday placed an order for 114 'Dhanush' long-range artillery guns. The order was placed after the Defence Ministry and the Indian Army gave their nod to the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) for production of 114 Dhanush artillery guns. Dhanush is the first ever indigenous 155 mm x 45 calibre long-range artillery gun that can be used in both desert and mountainous terrains.

The artillery gun is equipped with inertial navigation-based sighting system, auto-laying facility, onboard ballistic computation and an advanced day and night direct firing system. The self-propulsion unit allows the gun to negotiate and deploy itself in mountainous terrains with ease, the ministry said in a statement. India-US Defence Sales at All-Time High: Pentagon.

Dhanush has been mechanically upgraded to fire standard NATO 155 mm ammunition and can accommodate both boll bags and the bi-modular charge system (BMCS) which have resulted in increasing the range. Dhanush has also been electronically upgraded to enhance the firing accuracies, laying speeds of the existing gun and to provide compatibility with various kinds of ammo as well, it stated.

Stating that the performance of Dhanush has been evaluated under arduous conditions in several phases, the OFB said the guns travelled extensively in towed and self-propelled mode in all terrains, including desert and high altitude, with each gun clocking over 1,600 km. Such an extensive exercise was carried out by the user for the first time for any gun system under the process of induction, the OFB said.

DRDO, DGQA, Defence PSUs such as BEL and PSUs including SAIL and several private sector enterprises also contributed to the development of the artillery gun, it said.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 19, 2019 10:35 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).