Tipu Sultan pioneered rocket technology in India - DRDO

Eighteenth century warrior king Tipu Sultan will be officially recognized by India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) as the pioneer of rocket technology.

Chief Controller of Research and Development at DRDO Sivathanu Pillai told reporters after inspecting the rocket court at Tipu Sultan’s fort in Srirangapatna near here that “the time had come to tell the world that India pioneered rocket technology and Srirangapatna was its birthplace”.

Pillai went around various sites associated with Tipu Sultan’s rocket and missile technology activities at Srirangapatna on Thursday evening at the instance of President Dr A P J Abdul Kalam, who is himself a rocket scientist.

“I am convinced that Srirangapatna is the birthplace of modern rocket science and technology”, he said. Pillai first visited the rocket and missile launching pad attached to ramparts of the fort and the ammunition depot and later went to the ammunition-manufacturing unit in the fort.

Pillai, who played a key role in the development of Brahmos missile, said there was a growing consensus among scientists world wide about India’s progress in rocket science during the period of Tipu Sultan. He said DRDO would submit the impressions of his visit at a meeting of rocket scientists to be convened in the next few months.

DRDO would produce documents as evidence to prove the scientific principles followed in producing rockets during the time of Tipu Sultan, more than two centuries ago. An analysis of a rocket used by Tipu Sultan’s army, which is now exhibited in the artillery museum in London, proved that it was advanced and had a range of nearly 2 kms, he said.

“It is an important milestone in the history of rocket and we are intrigued as to how the idea of a rocket crystallized in the late eighteenth century for which research must have been conducted much earlier”, Pillai said.

The veteran scientist from DRDO, who also saw the paintings of Mysore War as represented by the artists of the era, said Tipu Sultan was the first to have a full-fledged rocket force with 6,000 personnel and 27 brigades in his army in 1792.

Though Pillai did not appear satisfied with the conservation of Tipu Sultan’s fort, he refused to comment on the deplorable condition of the rocket court, which had become an eye-sore due to absence of maintenance. “I am here purely on an academic mission. It will not be fair on my part to comment on the maintenance of the structures”, he said.