India Air Defence Shield Against Drones: India is working on a new air defence setup that joins many systems together in layers. The aim is to keep the country safe in all weather from drones, loiter ammunition and ballistic missiles. At Jaipur, on the first anniversary of Operation Sindoor, Deputy Chief of the Integrated Defence Staff Lieutenant General Zubin A Minwalla said, “We are working towards an integrated and layered architecture to ensure seamless protection against multiple threat vectors to include drones, loiter ammunition and missiles.”
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Why Operation Sindoor is talked about here?
The new plan grew faster after Operation Sindoor. Military leaders now see it as more than one strike. They treat it as proof that India’s defence system needs to keep changing. Lt Gen Minwalla said, “The success of Operation Sindoor is firmly rooted in the reforms initiated by the government, including the creation of the post of the Chief of Defence Staff.” He also said that new war technology like unmanned systems has made counter-drone and counter-loiter tools very important.
System is being tied together
A big part of the plan is joining existing air defence networks into one stronger chain. The Indian Army’s Integrated Air Command and Control System, also called IACCS, and the Akashteer battlefield air defence platform are already linked. Now the effort is to fold them into a full Joint Operations Control Centre so that targeting and decision-making can happen faster and in a more joined-up way. The plan also reaches into space work with ISRO and the Department of Space for better real-time intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance support.
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The new defence idea is not only about weapons in the sky. It also covers information and digital battles. Lt Gen Minwalla said that during Operation Sindoor, coordination with the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting created an effective civil-military model.
He added that a Defence Strategic Communication Division is now being built with AI-based tools to fight misinformation quickly in real time. He also said India knows Pakistan’s capabilities and is working to build even stronger systems of its own. Separately, Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh has also pointed to a possible rethink of India’s conventional missile use.
