Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Fourth industrial revolution
Mains level: Paper 3- Textile industry in South Asia and challenges ahead
Context
South Asia became a major player in the global textiles and clothing market with the onset of the third wave of global production.
Textile industry in Bangladesh
- Bangladesh overtook India in exports in the past decade as Indian labour costs resulted in products becoming 20% more expensive.
- Bangladesh joined the league in the 1980s, owing to the outbreak of the civil war in Sri Lanka.
- Lower production costs and free trade agreements with western buyers are what favour Bangladesh, which falls third in the line as a global exporter.
- Bangladesh has been ahead of time in adopting technology.
- Bangladesh also concentrates on cotton products, specialising in the low-value and mid-market price segment.
Where does India stand?
- The progress of India and Pakistan in readymade garments is recent when compared to their established presence in textiles.
- India holds a 4% share of the U.S.$840 billion global textile and apparel market, and is in fifth position.
- India has been successful in developing backward links, with the aid of the Technical Upgradation Fund Scheme (TUFS), in the cotton and technical textiles industry.
- However, India is yet to move into man-made fibres as factories still operate in a seasonal fashion.
Challenges ahead
1] Fourth Industrial revolution and robotic automation
- The Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) has been shifting focus from production machinery to integrating technology in the entire production life cycle.
- The production cycle incorporates all digital information and automation including robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality, 3D printing, etc.
- Robotic automation exemplifies production efficiency, especially in areas such as cutting and colour accuracy.
- The Asian Development Bank anticipates the challenges of job losses and disruption, inequality and political instability, concentration of market power by global giants and more vulnerability to cyberattacks.
- With a 7% unemployment rate, India faces the challenge of job creation in the wake of increased automation.
- The World Bank expects this trend to accelerate in the post-COVID-19 market.
- The 4IR may result in unemployment or poor employment generation, primarily affecting a low skill workforce.
2] Sustainability challenge
- Sustainability is also an important consideration for foreign buyers.
- Bangladesh’s readymade garments initiated ‘green manufacturing’ practices to help conserve energy, water, and resources.
- Textile and apparel effluents account for 17%-20% of all water pollution.
- The Indian government is committed to promoting sustainability through project sustainable resolution.
3] Labour issues
- Access to affordable labour continues to be an advantage for south Asia.
- In addition, a country such as India with a very high number of scientists and engineers could lead, as is evident in the areas of drones, AI and blockchain.
- India’s potential lies in its resources, infrastructure, technology, demographic dividend and policy framework.
- The creation of a Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution is indicative of India’s intent.
Way forward
- Digitalisation and automation in areas such as design, prototyping, and production are key in order to stay abreast, and in controlling production quality and timely delivery.
- Sustainable practices such as regenerative organic farming (that focuses on soil health, animal welfare, and social fairness), sustainable manufacturing energy (renewable sources of energy are used) and circularity are being adopted.
- Tax exemptions or reductions in imported technology, accessibility to financial incentives, maintaining political stability and establishing good trade relations are some of the fundamental forms of support the industry needs from governments.
- The U.S. trade war on China owing to human rights violations along with its economic bottlenecks, opens doors for India and Pakistan as they have strong production bases.
- Similar to China, India has a big supply — from raw material to garments.
- Bangladesh has also risen as a top exporter in a cost competitive global market.
- India’s proposed investments of US$1.4 billion and the establishment of all-in-one textile parks are expected to increase employment and ease of trade.
- India extended tax rebates in apparel export till 2024, with the twin goals of competitiveness and policy stability.
- Labour law reforms, additional incentives, income tax relaxations, duty reductions for man-made fibre, etc. are other notable moves.
- Newer approaches in the areas of compliance, transparency, occupational safety, sustainable production, etc. are inevitable changes in store for South Asia to sustain and grow business.
- Finally, there is a need for governments’ proactive support in infrastructure, capital, liquidity and incentivisation.
Conclusion
Ensuring government support for financial incentives, upgrading technologies and reskilling labour are key challenges.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 3- Vision for Defence Technology and Industrial Base
Context
Given its successive abstentions during votes on Ukraine in the UN Security Council and elsewhere, New Delhi has attracted criticism and even reproach from many quarters. While India’s abstentions may be hard to justify on moral grounds, they are certainly rooted in “realpolitik”.
Reasons for India’s stance
- There is irrefutable logic in the argument that safeguarding the source of 60-70 per cent of its military hardware constitutes a prime national interest for India.
- Any interruption in the supply of Russian arms or spares could have a devastating impact on our defence posture vis-à-vis the China-Pak axis.
- Even after diversification of sources, India remains trapped in the Russian bear’s jaws, jeopardising the credibility of its “strategic autonomy”.
Implications of India’s position
- The stance adopted by India has placed it amongst a minority of nations, alongside China and Pakistan.
- Seen widely as pro-Russian, this posture is likely to affect India’s international standing and bears reflection.
Suggestion
- The answers to India’s agonising dilemma lie in two drastic imperatives, which must receive the closest attention of decision-makers. They are:
- The “de-Russification of the armed forces” and the genuine “indigenisation of India’s defence technological and industrial base (DTIB)”.
- Russia’s military-industrial complex, in oligarch hands, has been struggling against inefficiency, poor quality control and deficient customer support.
- It is time to initiate a process of progressive “de-Russification” of Indian armed forces; not to switch sources, but of becoming self-reliant.
- It may be uplifting to see battle-tanks, warships and jet-fighters held up as examples of self-reliance, but what is never mentioned is that vital sub-systems like engines, guns, missiles, radars, fire-control computers, gear-boxes and transmission are either imported or assembled under foreign licences.
- Atmanirbhart requires selective identification of vital military technologies in which we are deficient and demands the initiation of well-funded, time-bound, mission-mode projects to develop (or acquire) the “know-how” as well as “know-why” of these technologies.
Conclusion
Having failed for 75 years after independence to attain a degree of self-reliance in military hardware that would have undergirded our “strategic autonomy,” it is time for India to zero in on the reasons why we have failed, where peer-nations like China, South Korea, Israel, Taiwan and even Singapore have succeeded spectacularly.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)
Mains level: Paper 2- Need for focus on China
Context
The Russian offensive on Ukraine on the night of February 23-34 shocked the world. The trigger for the conflict has been the rise of anti-Russia/Putin and pro-Europe lobby in Ukraine, led by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and with the tacit support of the US and the West.
Background of the conflict
- The situation became deeply polarised after battle lines were drawn in 2015, with Ukraine’s breakaway Donbas region seeking a merger with Russia, after Crimea’s unification with the latter.
- Russia has, over the years, quite correctly questioned the relevance of NATO — a grouping of the Cold War era — and its expansion eastwards.
- For instance, NATO included the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries of Georgia and Ukraine, earlier part of the Soviet Union, in its “Partnership for Peace” programme, despite Russian objections.
Implications of war for geopolitics and role of China
- Geopolitics will never be the same, especially with Germany and Japan announcing militarisation initiatives, polarisation in Europe and the strengthening of the anti-US nexus of China- Russia-Turkey-Iran.
- Focus moves away from China: A matter of concern is that once again, the attention of the US and the West has been diverted from China, the main adversary, to a war that should not have taken place.
- Possibility of annexation of Taiwan: In the current conflict, the ineptitude of the US/NATO to support Ukraine with “boots on the ground” is bound to embolden China in its nefarious design to annex Taiwan.
- This could also lead to increased hostility by China in the resolution of land disputes with the neighbouring countries, as well as in the South and East China seas.
Consider the question “With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the geopolitics will never be the same again.”Comment.
Conclusion
For India, the greatest lesson is that it will have to meet the Chinese challenge on its own. There is no likelihood of the US or any other nation getting involved in India’s fight with China. Let us focus on atmanirbharta in all its dimensions.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Reasonable Accommodation
Mains level: Not Much
The Karnataka High Court decision effectively upheld the denial of entry to students wearing the hijab. The court rejected an argument in support of permitting Muslim girls wearing head-scarves that was based on the principle of ‘reasonable accommodation’.
What is Reasonable Accommodation?
- ‘Reasonable accommodation’ is a principle that promotes equality, enables the grant of positive rights and prevents discrimination based on disability, health condition or personal belief.
- Its use is primarily in the disability rights sector.
- The provision plays a major role in addressing these barriers and thus contributes to greater workplace equality, diversity and inclusion.
Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD) defines:
- Reasonable accommodation is “necessary and appropriate modification and adjustments not imposing a disproportionate or undue burden, where needed in a particular case, to ensure to persons with disabilities the enjoyment or exercise on an equal basis with others of all human rights and fundamental freedoms”.
International Labour Organization (ILO), in its recommendation on HIV/AIDS and the world of work, defines:
- It is “any modification or adjustment to a job or to the workplace that is reasonably practicable and enables a person living with HIV or AIDS to have access to, or participate or advance in, employment”.
How does the principle work?
- The general principle is that reasonable accommodation should be provided, unless some undue hardship is caused by such accommodation.
- A modified working environment, shortened or staggered working hours, additional support from supervisory staff and reduced work commitments are ways in which accommodation can be made.
- Suitable changes in recruitment processes — allowing scribes during written tests or sign language interpreters during interviews — will also be a form of accommodation.
What is the legal position on this in India?
- In India, the Rights of People with Disabilities Act, 2016, defines ‘reasonable accommodation’ as “necessary and appropriate modification and adjustments, without imposing a disproportionate or undue burden in a particular case, to ensure to PwD the enjoyment or exercise of rights equally with others”.
- The definition of ‘discrimination’ in Section 2(h) includes ‘denial of reasonable accommodation’.
- In Section 3, which deals with equality and non-discrimination, sub-section (5) says: “The appropriate Government shall take necessary steps to ensure reasonable accommodation for persons with disabilities.”
Judicial interpretation of Reasonable Accommodation
- In Jeeja Ghosh and Another v. Union of India and Others (2016), the Supreme Court, awarded a compensation of ₹10 lakh to a passenger with cerebral palsy who was evicted from a flight after boarding.
- It said: “Equality not only implies preventing discrimination …, but goes beyond in remedying discrimination against groups suffering systematic discrimination in society.
- In concrete terms, it means embracing the notion of positive rights, affirmative action and reasonable accommodation.
- The Supreme Court elaborated on the concept in Vikash Kumar v. UPSC (2021).
- This was a case in which the court allowed the use of a scribe in the Union Public Service Commission examination for a candidate with dysgraphia, or writer’s cramp.
- It said failure to provide reasonable accommodation amounts to discrimination.
Context to the recent K’taka verdict
- In the recent Karnataka verdict on wearing the hijab, the High Court did not accept the argument for allowing minor variations to the uniform to accommodate personal religious belief.
- The HC meant that the court did not favour making any change or adjustment to the rule that could have enabled the students to maintain their belief or practice even while adhering to the uniform rule.
- The appeal against the verdict in the Supreme Court provides an opportunity to see if the concept can be used in the realm of belief and conscience too.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NPPA
Mains level: Drugs price regulation
Consumers may have to pay more for medicines and medical devices if the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) allows a price hike of over 10% in the drugs and devices listed under the National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM), this coming month.
Who regulates Drugs prices?
- The NPPA was set up in 1997 to fix/revise prices of controlled bulk drugs and formulations and to enforce price and availability of the medicines in the country, under the Drugs (Prices Control) Order, 1995-2013.
- Its mandate is:
- To implement and enforce the provisions of the DPCO in accordance with the powers delegated to it
- To deal with all legal matters arising out of the decisions of the NPPA
- To monitor the availability of drugs, identify shortages and to take remedial steps
- The NPPA is also mandated to collect/maintain data on production, exports and imports, market share of individual companies, profitability of companies etc., for bulk drugs and formulations and undertake and/ or sponsor relevant studies in respect of pricing of drugs/ pharmaceuticals.
How does the pricing mechanism work?
- Prices of Scheduled Drugs are allowed an increase each year by the drug regulator in line with the Wholesale Price Index (WPI) and the annual change is controlled and rarely crosses 5%.
- But the pharmaceutical players pointed out that over the past few years, input costs have flared up.
- The hike has been a long-standing demand by the pharma industry lobby.
- All medicines under the NLEM are under price regulation.
Do you know?
As per the Drugs (Prices) Control Order 2013, scheduled drugs, about 15% of the pharma market, are allowed an increase by the government as per the WPI while the rest 85% are allowed an automatic increase of 10% every year.
How are the prices determined?
- The ceiling price of a scheduled drug is determined by first working out the simple average of price to retailer in respect of all branded and generic versions of that particular drug formulation.
- It should have a market share of more than or equal to 1%, and then adding a notional retailer margin of 16% to it.
- The ceiling price fixed/revised by the NPPA is notified in the Gazette of India (Extraordinary) from time to time.
When are the prices revised?
- Prices are revised when there is a rise in the price of bulk drugs, raw materials, cost of transport, freight rates, utilities like fuel, power, diesel, and changes in taxes and duties.
- The cost rises for imported medicines with escalation in insurance and freight prices, and depreciation of the rupee.
- The annual hike in the prices of drugs listed in the NLEM is based on the WPI.
- The NLEM lists drugs used to treat fever, infection, heart disease, hypertension, anaemia etc and includes commonly used medicines like paracetamol, azithromycin etc.
Why are inputs costs high?
- One of the challenges is that 60%-70% of the country’s medicine needs are dependent on China.
- WPI is dependent on price rise in a basket of a range of goods that are not directly linked with the items that go into the cost of medicines.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Asiatic Cheetah
Mains level: Wildlife re-introduction and issues
The cheetah, which became extinct in India after Independence, is all set to return with the Union Government launching an action plan in Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh.
According to the plan, about 50 of these big cats will be introduced in the next five years, from the Africa savannas, home to cheetahs, an endangered species.
Distribution of cheetahs in India
- Historically, Asiatic cheetahs had a very wide distribution in India.
- There are authentic reports of their occurrence from as far north as Punjab to Tirunelveli district in southern Tamil Nadu, from Gujarat and Rajasthan in the west to Bengal in the east.
- Most of the records are from a belt extending from Gujarat passing through Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odisha.
- There is also a cluster of reports from southern Maharashtra extending to parts of Karnataka, Telangana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
- The distribution range of the cheetah was wide and spread all over the subcontinent. They occurred in substantial numbers.
- The cheetah’s habitat was also diverse, favouring the more open habitats: scrub forests, dry grasslands, savannahs and other arid and semi-arid open habitats.
What caused the extinction of cheetahs in India?
- The major reasons for the extinction of the Asiatic cheetah in India:
- Reduced fecundity and high infant mortality in the wild
- Inability to breed in captivity
- Sport hunting and
- Bounty killings
- It is reported that the Mughal Emperor Akbar had kept 1,000 cheetahs in his menagerie and collected as many as 9,000 cats during his half century reign from 1556 to 1605.
- The cheetah numbers were fast depleting by the end of the 18th century even though their prey base and habitat survived till much later.
- It is recorded that the last cheetahs were shot in India in 1947, but there are credible reports of sightings of the cat till about 1967.
Conservation objectives for their re-introduction
- Based on the available evidence it is difficult to conclude that the decision to introduce the African cheetah in India is based on science.
- Science is being used as a legitimising tool for what seems to be a politically influenced conservation goal.
- This also in turn sidelines conservation priorities, an order of the Supreme Court, socio-economic constraints and academic rigour.
- The issue calls for an open and informed debate.
What is the officially stated goal?
- To establish viable cheetah meta-population in India that allows the cheetah to perform its functional role as a top predator
- To provide space for the expansion of the cheetah within its historical range thereby contributing to its global conservation efforts
Issues in re-introduction
- Experts find it difficult whether the African cheetahs would find the sanctuary a favorable climate as far as the abundance of prey is concerned.
- The habitat of cheetahs needed to support a genetically viable population.
Back2Basics: Asiatic Cheetah
- Cheetah, the world’s fastest land animal was declared extinct in India in 1952.
- The Asiatic cheetah is classified as a “critically endangered” species by the IUCN Red List, and is believed to survive only in Iran.
- It was expected to be re-introduced into the country after the Supreme Court lifted curbs for its re-introduction.
- From 400 in the 1990s, their numbers are estimated to have reached to 50-70 today, because of poaching, hunting of their main prey (gazelles) and encroachment on their habitat.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Assam Accord
Mains level: Not Much
Last week, the Assam government informed the Assembly that nearly 1.44 lakh illegal foreigners had been identified in the state this year based on the 1985 Assam Accord, and around 30,000 of them had been deported to their country of origin.
Who is a foreigner under the Assam Accord?
- The Assam Accord was signed in 1985 by the Centre and the Assam government with the All Assam Student Union (AASU) and the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad.
- This movement had spearheaded the 1979-85 Assam Movement against migration from Bangladesh.
- It was against all migrants from Bangladesh, irrespective of religion.
- The Accord set March 24, 1971 as a cut-off. (The Assam Movement had demanded 1951 as the cut-off.)
- Anyone who had come to Assam before midnight on that date would be an Indian citizen, while those who had come after would be dealt with as foreigners.
- The same cut-off was used in updating the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
What are the expressions for which the definitions have not been determined? Why are they important?
- The definitions of phrases mentioned in the Accord such as ‘Axomiya janagan’ (Assamese people), ‘khilonjia’ (indigenous) and ‘adi basinda’ (original inhabitants) were yet to be determined.
- The context is Clause 6 of the Assam Accord, which promises “constitutional, legislative and administrative safeguards to protect, preserve and promote the cultural, social, linguistic identity and heritage of the Assamese people”.
- However, it doesn’t provide clear cut definitions to identify who would be the “Assamese people”.
- Clause 6 is important because many felt the 1971 cut-off was inadequate.
Issues with the cut-off date
- The cut-off for the rest of India is 1948, many noted that the Assam Accord would grant citizenship to a section of migrants who would be counted as foreigners elsewhere in the country.
- Clause 6 was, therefore, seen as a protective provision which would guarantee certain benefits to the Assamese people, while excluding some sections among those granted citizenship on the basis of the 1971 cut-off.
Why is the ‘Assamese’ definition difficult?
- Because Assam’s demography has been shaped by decades of migration.
- Many of the migrants had settled here during the colonial era.
- While they might not be native speakers of an indigenous language, such as Assamese or Bodo or Karbi, the question was whether the definition of “Assamese” could exclude someone, for example, whose family might have lived in Assam for 100 years.
Have any definitions been proposed?
- A key committee came in 2019, when Assam was rocked by protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) which proposes to grant citizenship to various categories of foreigners including Hindus from Bangladesh.
- The government set up the committee as a means to quell the protests.
This committee recommended following persons as Assamese:
- All citizens who are part of the Assamese community
- Any person of indigenous tribal community of Assam
- Any other indigenous community of Assam
- Any other citizens of India residing in the territory or Assam on or before January 1, 1951 and
- Descendants of these categories
- In essence, this definition includes not only the indigenous people but also all other Indian citizens, irrespective of mother tongue, as long as their ancestors were staying in Assam before 1951.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Par Tapi Narmada river-linking project
Mains level: Not Much
The tribals in Gujarat held a public meeting in Kaprada in Valsad district to protest against the Centre’s Par Tapi Narmada (PTN) river-linking project.
Par Tapi Narmada river-linking project
- The PTN link project was envisioned under the 1980 National Perspective Plan under the former Union Ministry of Irrigation and the Central Water Commission (CWC).
- The project proposes to transfer river water from the surplus regions of the Western Ghats to the deficit regions of Saurashtra and Kutch.
- It proposes to link three rivers — Par, originating from Nashik in Maharashtra and flowing through Valsad, Tapi from Saputara that flows through Maharashtra and Surat in Gujarat, and Narmada originating in Madhya Pradesh and flowing through Maharashtra and Bharuch and Narmada districts in Gujarat.
Components of the project
- The link mainly includes the construction of seven dams (Jheri, Mohankavchali, Paikhed, Chasmandva, Chikkar, Dabdar and Kelwan), three diversion weirs and two tunnels.
- Of these, the Jheri dam falls in Nashik, while the remaining dams are in Valsad and Dang districts of South Gujarat.
Centre’s role
- A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between Gujarat, Maharashtra and the central government on May 3, 2010.
- It envisaged that Gujarat would get the benefit of the Par Tapi Narmada link project through en-route irrigation from the link canal and in the drought-prone Saurashtra Kutch region by way of substitution.
Issues with the Project
- About 6065 hectares of land area will be submerged due to the proposed reservoirs.
- A total of 61 villages will be affected, of which one will be fully submerged and the remaining 60 partly.
- The total number of affected families would be 2,509 of which 98 families would be affected due to the creation of the Jheri reservoir, the only one in Maharashtra, spread over six villages.
- The affected families may lose their lands or houses or both in the submergence when the reservoirs are created.
- The districts where the project will be implemented are largely dominated, by tribals who fear displacement.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Kinzhal Missile
Mains level: Not Much
Russia said that it had unleashed hypersonic missiles against an arms depot in Ukraine, the first use of the next-generation weapons in combat.
Kinzhal Missile
- It is a nuclear-capable air-launched ballistic missile that flies at 10 times the speed of sound and can overcome air-defence systems. Kinzhal means ‘dagger’.
- The missile has a range of approximately 1,500-2,000km and can carry a nuclear payload or conventional payload of 480 kg.
- The Kinzhal was one of an array of new weapons Russian President Vladimir Putin unveiled in his state-of-the-nation address in 2018. Putin had termed Kinzhal as “an ideal weapon”.
- This is the first time that Russia has admitted to using the high-precision weapon in combat.
- Following launch, the Kinzhal rapidly accelerates to Mach 4 (4,900 km/h), and may reach speeds of up to Mach 10 (12,350 km/hr).
What is a hypersonic weapon?
- They are normally defined as fast, low-flying, and highly manoeuvrable weapons designed to be too quick and agile for traditional missile defence systems to detect in time, according to Bloomberg.
- Unlike ballistic missiles, hypersonic weapons don’t follow a predetermined, arched trajectory and can maneuver on the way to their destination.
- The term “hypersonic” describes any speed faster than five times that of sound, which is roughly 760 miles (1,220 kilometers) per hour at sea level.
- At hypersonic speeds, the air molecules around the flight vehicle start to change, breaking apart or gaining a charge in a process called ionization.
- This subjects the hypersonic vehicle to “tremendous” stresses as it pushes through the atmosphere.
Types of hypersonic weapons
- There are two main types of these weapons — glide vehicles and cruise missiles.
- Most of the attention is focused on the former, which are launched from a rocket before gliding to their target, because of the challenges of achieving hypersonic propulsion of missiles.
- The missiles have engines called scramjets that use the air’s oxygen and produce thrust during their flight, allowing them to cruise at a steady speed and altitude.
Who has these weapons?
- US, China and Russia have the most advanced capabilities.
- Several other countries are investigating the technology, including India, Japan, Australia, France, Germany and North Korea, which claims to have tested a hypersonic missile.
- In fact, India is also closing in on having such weapons in its arsenal.
- Last year, India successfully tested its hypersonic technology demonstrator vehicle (HSTDV), powered by a scramjet engine.
- The HSTDV will serve as a crucial building block in the development of long-range hypersonic weapons, which will take at least another four to five years to become a reality.
Back2Basics: Types of Missiles
(1) Subsonic missiles
- They travel at a rate slower than the speed of sound.
- Most well-known missiles, such as the US Tomahawk cruise missile, the French Exocet, and the Indian Nirbhay, fall into this category.
- These travel at about Mach-0.9 (705 mph), and are slower and easier to intercept, but they continue to play a significant role in modern battlefields.
- They significantly less expensive to produce because the technological challenges have already been overcome and mastered.
- Due to their low speed and small size, subsonic missiles provide an additional layer of strategic value.
(2) Supersonic missiles
- They are the one that travels faster than the speed of sound (Mach 1) but not faster than Mach-3.
- Most supersonic missiles travel at speeds ranging from Mach-2 to Mach-3, or up to 2,300 mph.
- The Indian/Russian BrahMos, currently the fastest operational supersonic missile capable of speeds of around 2,100–2,300 mph, is the most well-known supersonic missile.
(3) Hypersonic Missiles
Explained above
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