Pralay SRBM: Missile that can dodge Air defense system

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) Wednesday successfully carried out the maiden test of ‘Pralay’, a new surface-to-surface conventional quasi-ballistic missile, in a boost for India’s tactical battlefield strategy.

A quasi-ballistic missile has a low trajectory, and while it is largely ballistic, it can manoeuvre in flight. Pralay with a light payload of 500kg will be able to hit a target as far as 400km.Pralay was developed to counter deployment of Dongfeng 12 (DF-12) short-range tactical ballistic missile bordering India by the Chinese Army. Dongfeng 12 (DF-12) is said to be having a range of 100-250 with an actual possible range of as much as 400 km.

Pralay missile that will play a crucial role in the upcoming Rocket force, the fourth arm of the Indian Armed forces that will be raised soon. Pralay (havoc, destruction) as its name is exactly what its role will be to strike fast and strike valuable targets inside the enemy camp while also having the ability to evade the air defense system due to its non-parabolic trajectories.

Pralay with help of its jet vane control system (JVC) and its tandem fins can fly depressed trajectories and can change its flight in the terminal phase. a ballistic missile that flies like a sub-sonic cruise missile inside the atmosphere but at near hypersonic speeds will make it near to impossible for it to be intercepted by any modern dedicated anti-ballistic missile defense system and impossible to be intercepted by an air defense system.

Pralay will also carry on-board inertial navigation system (INS) and will carry a warhead weighing under 800kgs with a circular error probable (CEP) of less than 10 meters. Pralay will also have unconventional flight profile and will have the ability to change directions to make it more unpredictable and raise difficulty level for Air Defence Systems and mobility of the launch platform also makes a launch difficult to prevent.

India is also working on a Pralay variant that will be equipped with a W band MMW seeker that has a lock on before and locks on after launch with 3km detection range against ground targets like ground-based radars. Pralay will be the workhorse of the upcoming Integrated Rocket Force due to cheaper production costs and also since the missile is entirely made up of systems and components of other missiles that are already in production.