By Col NB Saxena
New Delhi. 10 Feb 2016. The Eighteenth Meeting of Army Technology Board is being held at College of Military Engineering, Pune under the Chairmanship of Lt Gen PM Hariz, General Officer Commanding in Chief, Army Training Command (ARTRAC). Army Technology Board provides a platform to leverage the technological expertise of Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institutes of Information Technology into useful solutions and products for the Army, in an economical and reasonable time frame.
The board reviewed the progress of 21 on going projects and also considered certain new proposals under the enhanced budget ceiling for R&D projects through technical government institutes. Lt Gen PM Hariz, in his address asked the forum to synergize R & D efforts under ATB with Army’s capability development plans and focus on technologies as reflected in technology perspective and capability roadmaps document issued by Ministry of Defence.
The Chairman, ATB highlighted the key emerging technology fields as Battlefield Transparency, Command and Control Systems, Communication Systems, Nanotechnology, Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) Defence and Smart Antenna System that can be pursued by ATB. The vision of the ATB envisages meeting immediate requirements of field formations and training institutes with projects that have low gestation period and help to improve efficiency of our troops.