MHOW: “Mission Sudarshan Chakra’’, India’s proposed air defence system announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day address to the nation, will act as a shield as well as a sword, requiring a whole-of-nation approach, Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) Gen. Anil Chauhan said here on Tuesday.
Sudarshan Chakra will entail a colossal amount of integration of sensors, missiles, surveillance apparatus and artificial intelligence tools, Gen Chauhan said as he articulated the broad contours of the ambitious project. The CDS is the first top military officer who spoke about Sudarshan Chakra. He was addressing the first edition of Ran Samwad at Army War College in this town in Madhya Pradesh.
The CDS said, “The aim is to develop a system to protect India’s strategic, civilian, and nationally important sites.” Calling it “India’s own Iron Dome (Israel’s missile shield) or Golden Dome (a proposed multi-layer defence system for the United States)”, he said, “A colossal amount of data will need to be analysed for information and real-time response. I am sure we will do it at an affordable cost.”
Army War College, Mhow, is organising a two-day tri-service dialogue on war, warfare and warfighting — “Ran Samwad” 2025, bringing serving military professionals to the forefront of strategic dialogue.
Gen Chauhan also briefly delved into Operation Sindoor and said a number of lessons have been learnt from the conflict and they are being implemented.
“Operation Sindoor was a modern conflict from which we learned a number of lessons, and most of them are under implementation, some have been implemented,” he noted.
The top military officer broadly elaborated on the possible structure of the Sudarshan Chakra, describing it as India’s own “Iron Dome or Golden Dome”.
“I think the aim is to develop a system to protect India’s strategic, civilian and nationally important sites, and it will act both as a shield as well as a sword,” the Chief of Defence Staff said.
“It will entail the development of robust infrastructure and processes for the detection, acquisition, and neutralisation of the enemy’s air vectors, including using both soft kills and hard kills, both kinetic and direct energy weapons.”
Gen Chauhan said the missile shield will comprise various elements of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) as well as various weapons systems. “We’ll have to look at multi-domain ISR, integration of ground, air, maritime, undersea, space, sensors, all becoming a key necessity and integrating them,” he said.
The CDS said the missile shield project will also have applications of artificial intelligence, advanced computation, data analytics, big data and quantum technologies.
“For a vast country like India, a project of this magnitude will require a whole-of-nation approach. But like always, I am very sure Indians will do it at a minimal and very affordable cost,” he said.
PM Modi announced the Sudarshan Chakra project days after Pakistan Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir reportedly hinted at targeting Indian assets along the border, including Reliance Industries Ltd’s Jamnagar refinery in Gujarat, in case of any future military confrontation between the two countries. The project is planned to be implemented by 2035.
Emphasising that battlefields of tomorrow will not recognise service boundaries, he called for swift and decisive joint responses across domains to ensure victory in future wars.
Describing Aatmanirbharta in defence and integrated logistics as key to emerge victorious in the wars to come, the CDS reaffirmed that ‘jointness’ is foundational to India’s transformation. He underscored the need to institutionalise joint training and absorb constantly evolving technologies such as artificial intelligence, cyber and quantum to enhance operational capability.
Gen Chauhan said that developing capabilities in multiple domains is central for attaining victory in future wars. Citing Kautilya, he said India has been a fountainhead of ideas and knowledge since ancient times. However, very little literature on scholarly analysis of Indian Wars or academic discourse on strategy exists.
The CDS pointed out that the idea of Ran Samwad is to create space for actual practitioners, especially young and middle-level officers, who are aware of technological advancements.
General Chauhan highlighted the transformation of battlefields, noting that the significance of airspace now extends to the near-space range of 80–100 kilometres, critical for hypersonic systems and high-altitude platforms. At the tactical level, the proliferation of drones and precision-guided munitions demanded new coordination models.
He spoke of the continuing tension between precision and mass in warfare, observing that while precision delivers specific effects with fewer resources, mass cannot be dismissed entirely given the hybrid nature of contemporary conflicts.
Electronic warfare, he warned, must now be recognised as a domain in its own right alongside space, cyber and the cognitive sphere. Modern vulnerabilities, he pointed out, stem from sensor-driven targeting systems, and disrupting them is essential for protecting platforms. He also drew attention to data security, linking it directly to India’s ability to harness artificial intelligence in the future. Without securing and structuring data today, he said, India would be unable to fully utilise AI-driven capabilities five years down the line.
Vice Admiral Tarun Sobti underscored how conventional concepts of air superiority are becoming increasingly fragile, citing Russia’s experience in Ukraine. He argued that space has become central to the conduct of war, noting that China’s extensive satellite network provides near-total battlefield visibility and a significant planning advantage. For India, he said, space assets must be treated as essential rather than supplementary to security.
Air Marshal Tejinder Singh described artificial intelligence as “the new electricity” and emphasised its operational necessity in areas ranging from predictive maintenance to drone swarming. He stressed that cyber and quantum technologies would be decisive in future conflicts, with quantum offering both unprecedented opportunities in secure communications and challenges in stealth detection. He also flagged hypersonic weapons as a formidable threat, describing them as unpredictable and difficult to counter due to their cross-domain reach.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will deliver the plenary address on the second and final day. A few joint doctrines and the technology perspective and capability roadmap will also be released during the event.