PUNE, Jan 25: City scientists, involved in the Pokharan nuclear tests and development of Prithvi missile, have done Pune proud bagging the Scientific Development awards instituted by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).S M Wele, associate director of Research and Development Establishment (Engrs), Dighi and S L Kohli, associate director, Armament and Research Development Establishment (ARDE) who have been working on the Prithvi project have won the Rs 10 lakh award for the Prithvi team.The award is in recognition of their efforts to design, develop and induct into service highly complicated, multi-disciplinary Prithvi missile systems which have been accepted by users and are under productionisation.Wele has been working with R & DE (Engrs) for the last 29 years as a scientist.ARDE Pune scientists led by their director S K Salwan who form part of the path-breaking research for the recently conducted Pokharan nuclear tests bagged the team award of Rs 10 lakh. The teams of ARDE, DRDL, RCI, TBRL, HEMRL, ADRDE and MSQAA have been involved in the development of the Prithvi Munition Warheads.Anil Datar of ARDE won Rs 1 lakh award of Scientist of the Year. He has been closely involved in the design, development and productionisation of 5.56 mm Indian Small Arms System (INSAS) for the armed forces. He was responsible for solving the critical problems at all stages of system development. M V Rameshkumar of ARDE received the Rs 50,000 Young Scientist of the Year award. He was closely involved with safety and arming mechanisms for missile warheads.
