This story is from January 9, 2018

Jhargram-born scientist discovers low cost material to build anti-landmine vehicle

Jhargram-born scientist discovers low cost material to build anti-landmine vehicle
Professor Santanu Bhowmick
KOLKATA: Aerospace Engineering researcher Professor Santanu Bhowmick, who hails from Jhargram district of West Bengal, has discovered a unique raw material to manufacture light weight anti landmine-vehicles.
The anti-landmine vehicles used by the defence organisations in India usually weigh 10-15 tonnes. Whereas vehicles manufactured using raw material discovered by Profesor Bhowmick will weigh only 5 tonnes, resulting in faster spped and greater mobility, especially in hilly terrains.
The new material is also capable of withstanding heat upto 2400 degrees celcius. Usually, heat generated during a landmine blast measures upto 2000 degrees celcius.
Professor Bhowmick has already discovered a light weight bulletproof jacket which has been approved by the empowered committee of the Ministry of Defence. The jacket is made from indigenous ultra modern lightweight thermoplastic technology. It has been included in the Prime Minister's 'Make in India' project.
Anti-landmine vehicles used in India are made of steel which tends to melt by the heat generated by landmine blasts, resulting in the death of its occupants -namely security personnel and jawans.
According to Professor Bhowmick, "Primarily the new vehicle will be provided with a heat withstanding ceramic and steel plate fitted to its base. The other portions of the vehicle will be made of steel. Later the entire vehicle can be made entirely of this material which will make it lighter. The material remains unchnged even at the highest temperature limit of 2400 degrees celcius."
The vehicle base will be made of three layers of heat resistant ceramic plates of 60mm thickness.

Professor Bhowmick claims that the new anti-landmine vehicle will be made by the Tata group at their Jamshedpur workshop. On January 4, a meeting was held between him and the representatives of Tata group. According to Bhowmick, "Tata will supply high quality steel. The vehicle will be entirely made by Indian technology."
The newly discovered material's patent has been secured by Bhowmick. The new series of vehicles will be ready by 2020, confirms the scientist.
On Monday, the professor delivered a presentation about the newly discovered technology at the Army Technology Seminar 2018 using slide shows to illustrate his findings. According to him, "In the future this raw material may be used in building army bunkers, tanks, missiles and space research centres too."
Bhowmick has been assisted in the research by three other scientists - Govindraju M, G Ajesh and V Shivakumar.
Monday's presentation was attended by the Indian Army chief Gen. Bipin Rawat and many top ranking Army officers. DRDO director S Christopher was also present at the show together with scientists from the Chennai and Gandhinagar IITs.
Professor Bhowmick's discovery is considered an important progress towards Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Make In India project especially in the Defence sector.
Read this story in Bengali
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