India’s Army Launches AWAN Network

India Defence reports that India’s President Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam recently dedicated the Army Wide Area Network (AWAN), which has been designed to connect all Army formations, units, training establishments and logistic installations in the country. Kalam congratulated the team of Corps of signals and Tata Consultancy Services for undertaking this project and completing it in time across 174 signal centres. AWAN will replace the existing 1980s technology message handling network called Automatic Message Switching System. It will provide secure and direct information exchange without intermediate handling or intervention, and will enable data exchange services including audio and video. Dr. Kalam added that AWAN may encompass the entire defence service and interlink with other government departments dealing with national security and crisis response. Minister of State for Defence Shri M Pallam Raju, in turn, discussed AWAN in terms of information superiority as a force multiplier and Network enabled warfare. The Chief of Army Staff Gen. J J Singh, meanwhile, described AWAN as amongst the first major initiatives undertaken to prepare Indian Army for fighting in the digital battle space.