'Asmi': India's first indigenous machine pistol developed by Indian Army & DRDO in big win

Defence Ministry on Thursday said that Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Army have jointly developed country's first indigeus 9 mm machine pistol named ''Asmi". It said Army's infantry school in Mhow and DRDO's Armament Research and Development Establishment (ARDE) in Pune have designed and developed weapon.

' weapon has potential for exports': Defence Ministry

ministry said weapon has been developed in a record time of four months. " machine pistol fires in-service 9mm ammunition and sports an upper receiver me from aircraft-gre aluminium and lower receiver from carbon fibre. A 3-dimensional printing process has been used in designing and prototyping of various parts including trigger components me by metal 3D printing," Defence Ministry said in a statement.

statement said weapon has huge potential in armed forces as a personal weapon for heavy weapon detachments, commanders, tank and aircraft crews, drivers/dispatch riders, rio/rar operators, closed quarter battle, counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations etc.  weapon is also likely to find huge employability with central and state police organizations as well as VIP protection duties and Policing, it ded. 

" machine pistol is likely to have a production cost under Rs 50,000 each and has potential for exports," statement said. weapon is aptly named “Asmi” meaning “Pride”, “Self-Respect" and “Hard Work”.

"Keeping Hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision of Aatmnirbhar Bharat in view, this small step will pave way for self-reliance and it is expected that Services and Paramilitary Forces (PMFs) will induct this expeditiously," Defence Ministry said.

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India clears Tejas LCA fighter jet deal 

Meanwhile, in a major decision aimed at boosting domestic aero industry, India on Wednesday approved a much-awaited deal worth Rs 48,000 crore to procure 83 indigeusly-developed Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas for Indian Air Force.  decision to procure fleet was taken at a meeting of Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said.

Around three years back, Indian Air Force h issued an initial tender for procurement of 83 Tejas aircraft, a four-and-half generation combat jet which is manufactured by state-run aero behemoth Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). IAF has alrey inducted a batch of Tejas aircraft as part of its initial order of 40 jets.

In a statement, Defence Ministry said government approved procurement of 73 LCA Tejas of Mk-1A variant and 10 LCA Tejas Mk-1 trainer aircraft at cost of Rs 45,696 crore along with design and development of infrastructure worth Rs 1,202 crore.

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(With ncy inputs)