India’s Prithvi-II Missile Tested Today

India’s surface-to-surface Prithvi-II (P-II) missile was successfully flight tested on at 9AM today from the country’s missile test range on the Eastern seaboard. The launch was carried out as part of regular training exercises of the Army and nuclear command. Prithvi-II, the first indigenous surface-to-surface strategic missile, capable of attacking targets at ranges of 350-km, hit a predefined target in the Bay of Bengal with “very high accuracy of better than 10 meters”, according to a DRDO statement. An Indian Navy ship located near the target recorded the final event. The flight test of the Prithvi-II met all the mission objectives.

Photos / DRDO

33 thoughts on “India’s Prithvi-II Missile Tested Today”

  1. Was it a Prithvi testor did the Prithvi airframe act as atestbed for some future missile's sub-systems?

    With a supersonic 290Km range Brahmos in its inventory, work in progress on a hypersonic variant, another subsonic CM with much higher range in the works, it simply fails logic, why is the Prithvi being tested so many times.

  2. Shiv,
    Can you throw some lighton India's latest missile projects like SLBMs,k-series, long range cruise missile

  3. @ArjunTankFan cant u read???
    The launch was carried out as part of regular training exercises of the Army and nuclear command..
    and hypersonic and subsonic missiles are under development,prithvi 2 is operational missile

  4. Dear

    Shiv Aroor

    I have some questions for which I would like answers

    Q1. Is India planning a 6000 km Agni-6

    Q2. You just posted the pic of Bhim SP howitzers, whose gun is that

    Q3. What happened to Prithvi 1 missiles are they out of service

    Q4. Heard India and Russia will start the joint development of a single engine 5th gen fighter after work on PAK FA/FGFA is finished and it joins serial production

    I request you to please give answer atleast once

    thanks

    Joydeep Ghosh

  5. Too many haters on this forum..

    They always seem to criticise every other action the DRDO or Indian military takes, always complaining that not enough progress is being made or if something is done then question it's purpose, Guys for christ's stop complaining.

  6. Just one question:
    Is the pic that of actual launch? or you used one from library?.
    B'coz it may be that some new msl system may be tested in the garb of prithvi.

  7. To ArjunTankFan: The 350km-range Prithvi-2 missile has not takers except the DRDO. It is NOT in the operational inventory of the Strategic Forces Command. This test-firing was carried out with a missile supplied by the DRDO from its in-house stocks of Prithvi-2s, while the Army's Regmt of Artillery supplied the human resources back-up. It is for this very reason that the press statement was issued by the DRDO and no one from the armed forces uttered even an official word. The only surface-to-surface battlefield support missiles that have been ordered to date by all three armed services is the BrahMos multi-role supersonic cruise missile. In operational terms attaining a CEP of better than 10 metres doesn't achieve anything when the pre-defined target is being engaged by a missile launched from a pre-surveyed launchpad. Therefore, the Prithvi in ALL its manifestations is a dead dog that continues to be flogged by the DRDO for meaningless glory. And the sooner the MoD dumps this discredited missile in favour of the cannister-mounted Shaurya, the better for all Indian taxpayers.

    To Joydeep Ghosh:
    1) Is India planning a 6,000km-range Agni-6? Of course, anyone is free to plan for anything anytime. But will India develop the Agni-6? Well, let's at least give the Agni-5 a chance first.
    2) The Bhim tracked 155mm/52-cal self-propelled howitzer is one of only two prototypes built so far whose sole custodian today is the DRDO.
    3) Prithvi-1s are still in service with the 2 Prithvi Missile Groups (333 & 444) under the Army's 40 & 41 Artillery Divisions.
    Khush? Happy? Elated? Relieved? Overjoyed? Enlightened? Illuminated? Awakened? Have answered 3 of your 4 questions. Will leave the last one to be answered by Mr Shiv Aroor.

  8. Anon @ 4:02 PM

    I can read and understand very well, thank-you.

    Army training exercise is usually the perfect cover for all test launches.

    I just wished to know if Shiv could throw some more light on this.

  9. DRDO should stop publishing test results…
    if the product is good our armed forces would certainly take it and the MOD n media will respect the achievement!!!

  10. @ prasun…dont you think the allegation that is made in force that the tests are stage managed is quite serious.[I understand that he means that the target was not acquired n hit but the path was pre programmed whereas what should have been done is the end point [to simulate the detection part]told to the system and it makes up the path on its own..correct me if it is something else ]..there is no proof that it is stage managed (atleast nothing shown in that article)…shouldnt ppl like you ask for proof on such claims?? or atleast ask such Q to ppl @ DRDO and get definite answers failing which ask the minister…

  11. is there any news on mahindra AXE and other trial vehicles and who passed the trial? and any info on F-INSAS?

  12. @kalicharan:
    Cut him a bit of slack, he is just a human… every scientist needs to 'release' his tension every once in a while…

  13. @prasun da

    Thanks for taking the effort to reply on a blog that belongs to someone else.

    as for the answers, i would say i am Enlightened, just one thing

    you said you answered 3 of 4 actually its 2 and half b'coz i still didnt get the answer whose gun has been put on Arjun chassis, as Shiv said earlier, a Skorean co. was the single vendor left and MOD does not entertain this condition

    Keep enlighting 🙂

    Thanks

    Joydeep Ghosh

  14. Wonder if this version of prithvi can be used as a Chinese aircraft carrier killer just like the Chinese sashoijan …. It pays to plan ahead asymmetrically against the Chinese … It's quite possible that they will have more carriers. Than India in a decade.

  15. Pretty good accuracy, so that it can enter directly in to a terrorist den or in to an inimical silo or any premium target with any kind of warhead.

  16. the tragedy is that here some two bit journalist who probably doesnt know the difference between ballistic coefficient and drag coefficient ends up criticising DRDO's ballistic missile program and tries to pass off garbage as some great analysis. People should remember that testing a missile involves a lot of ground work in terms of logistics ships need to be kept out of the flight path to avoid any misbehaviour in the missile subsystem, telemetry needs to be setup, lots of personnel need to be stationed at the test range and lots of verification equipment needs to be setup at the impact site. DRDL is not as incompetent as this journalist to indulge in such cheap gimmicks to boost their ego. And what great logic when it comes to the armed forces personnel present there, according to him, they had no work so they ended up whiling away their time at the test range providing back up, I cant stop laughing seeing the stupidity in his comments.

  17. To [email protected]: Instead of firing the Prithvi-2 from the ITR, take it to the firing range at Pokhran and fire it from there out to its minimum range of 40km (since the range has a length of only 59km) by punching in the target coordinates into the fire-control system in real-time (as was done with the BrahMos Block 2). And IF the missile achieves a CEP of 10 metres or less, by all means then release the photo of the target (again as BrahMos Aerospace had done in the past).

    To [email protected]: Yes, they are indeed serious, and the continuing lack of authentic verifiable data from the DRDO will have a disastrous effect on the nuclear thresholds of both India and Pakistan. If the DRDO is indeed confident about achieving a CEP of less then 10 metres for the Prithvi-2, then by all means this should be demonstrated under actual battlefield conditions over a ground-based firing range and not over the sea.

    To Joydeep Ghosh: The turret and the 155mm/52-cal gun both came from Denel/LIW of South Africa. That is the ONLY turret/gun that has been integrated to date with the Arjun Mk1's hull. The vital tracked ammo resupply vehicle, which normally in case of all other tracked self-propelled howiters (SPH) worldwide forms an integral part of the tracked SPH, has not yet been developed for the Bhim SPH. It should be noted that whenever an army chooses a tracked SPH, it also goes for a tracked ammo resupply vehicle using the the same hull as that of the tracked SPH. As to why the DRDO didn't develop the Bhim's tracked ammo resupply vehicle, well, that's an entirely different story altogether.

  18. Anon 7.53PM,
    Prasun didn't launch a personal attack on anyone. Why are you indulging in one? If you have to counter his views then you should counter that with facts and not with your cheap personal attacks on anyone. People like Prasun, or people who boldly point out the shortcomings of our defense projects and plans are extremely few as there are very few qualified people who can do this job competently.

  19. @anon 7.53pm, i guess what anon at 7.53 pm is saying is about the scathing attack on DRDO by the article listed by Prasun K Sengupta and not on Prasun himself. indeed it is an amateuristic article. Every one has the right to critisize, but remember it is every one (including the person critisizing could be at receiving end)

  20. @prasun
    how does firing over sea/land change anything ..(i dont anything about testing…i honestly dont understand how they test those 1000km missiles n all!!)

  21. @anon 259
    the right to criticize is the exclusive perogative of reporters..thats their job…not yours!!

  22. @anon2.17

    then you shouldnt be there in the blog community. If you cannot take being critisized how can you critisize some one. Reporters job is to report news not to critisize, but they can critisize as do any one else…i hope you understand.

    constructive criticism is the essence of a democracy that is why we have an opposition also in parliament. I am sure they are not all reporters!

Leave a Reply to Anonymous Cancel Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


Scroll to Top