The launch of the missile programme trishul was conducted on September 16th 1985.

It took place in the

test range Shriharikota. The test was successful. The aerodynamic drag was higher than expected. This
test had little significance in terms of technological breakthrough.

This was followed by successful test of Pilotless Target Aircraft (PTA). Its engine was developed by DRDO
engineers which was designed by ADE. They were slowly graduating from single laboratory projects to
multiple laboratory project. The development of PTA symbolized the confluences of four different
organisations which ISRO, DRDL, ADE and DTD.

Academic institutions of the country helped in the development of these missile programmes some of
them being Indian Institute of science (IISc) and Javadpur University. Dr Kalam shares his views and tells
the readers that he has deep regards for academic institutions. He gives several examples of how
Academic Institutions have helped them earlier like a team of young graduate scientists of Jadavpur
University under the guidance of prof. Ghoshal developed the required robust internal guidance
algorithm, whereas at the IISc postgraduate students under the guidance of prof IG Sharma air defence
software for multi target acquisition by Akash.

Agni is a two stage rocket system and employs re-entry technology developed in the country for the first
time. For the Agni the payload gets delivered at hypersonic speeds. The payload along with guidance
system is housed in the re-entry vehicle structure which is meant to keep the temperature inside below
40oC even when temperature outside are as high as 2500oC. Carbon-Carbon nosetips were used as they
can handle such high temperatures. It was designed within 18 months.

Another challenge in Agni payload was to handle the tremendous speed with which the re-entry vehicle
would enter with, which was speed of 12 mach. To use wind tunnel which can create wind of such high
speeds they would American help which they didn’t want to take. But 4 students of IISc along with their
Professor developed software for Computational Fluid Dynamics for Hypersonic Regimes. As the work
spread horizontally giving performance became very hard as Kalam was leading over 500 scientists. He
had finalize it in the form of Annual confidential report (ACR). These were taken as recommendation for
promotion. So, Kalam had to be a fair judge on who deserves it.

When a person looks at himself he is likely to misjudge himself as he looks only at his intention, he thinks
that any action he takes is fine until his intention is good, which is a very wrong way to judge ourselves.
Every action that we take defines us.

The problem we have is that we merely analyse our life instead of dealing with it. People dissect for
failure, its causes and effects but seldom deal with it. According to Kalam through difficulties and failures
God gives us an opportunity to grow and learn. We should try to find golden opportunity from the
wreckage of failure.

To motivate people to enhance their performance and dealing with depression is always a challenge for a
leader. Kalam observed an analogy between force field equilibrium and resistance to change an
organization. According to him these resistance can be stopped permanently which will result in less
energy required to bring and maintain these changes.

Kalam tried to build a supportive environment in 1983 while launching of IGMDP which helped in bringing
about a reform in the organization. The re-organization resulted in 40-50% increase in level of activity.
The multiple projects were entering into development and flight testing stage. The milestones gave
inspiration to the people to work. The average age of scientists went down to 33 from 42 due to hiring of
many young scientists. Kalam thought that re-organization needed happen once again.

In 1983, Re-organization was done with the objective of renewal, it was very complex but was handled
carefully by A V ranga rao. They created a team of young scientists with one experienced one and gave
them the challenge of building a strap down guidance system, an on board computer and a ram rocket in
propulsion system. These exercises were attempted first time in the country. The young team not only
designed them all but also made their operational equipment. It was a good demonstration of the
‘renewal factor’.

Often people seek to satisfy their social, egoistic and self-actualization needs at their workplace. Kalam
tried to satisfy all these needs which happened due to the re-organization that took place 1983. They
retained the structure design of a laboratory and undertook a task design exercise.

Work on prithvi was nearly completed by the start of 1988. For the first time in the country, clustered
liquid propellant engine were going to be used. The project’s success depend upon creative ideas being
converted in to workable products and the quality and thoroughness of the team member’s contribution.
Y Gyaneshwar and P Venugopalan did a great job in instilling a sense of pride and achievement in the
team.

Vehicle development was given to Sundaram and Sarswat. Kalam looked at the vulnerable areas of the
project. Meticulous planning went in development of Launch Release Mechanism (LRM).

As Interim test range at balasore was not complete they had to set up special facilities as SHAR for the
launch of Prithvi, some of them being launch pad, block house, control consoles and Mobile Telemetry
Station. Kalam got to meet his old friend Mr Kurup who had become director of SHAR centre by then.

Prithvi was launched at 11:23 hrs on 25th February 1988. It was an epoch making event in the history of
rocketry in the country. Prithvi was the basic module for all the guided missiles of the country. It was
capable of delivering 1000 kg warhead to a distance of 150 km with accuracy of 50 meter. Circular Error
Probable (CEP) is radius of the circle within which 50% of the missiles will impact. The Iraqi scud missiles
have a CEP of about 1 km whereas a German V-2 missiles fired at London during WW2 had a CEP of about
17 km. The team tried to reduce the CEP as less as 50 meters when the west was crying over NPT. The
development of Prithvi scared the whole world. After the successful launch of Prithvi, India came out as a
self-reliant nation.

India’s core competence in the field of rocketry was firmly established. The robust space industry and
viable missile based defences brought India into a select club of nations which can call theselves
superpower.

Two centuries of oppression and ruling were unable to stop the creativity and capability of Indian people.
Within a decade of gaining Independence, Indian Space and Atomic energy programme was established.

Kalam believed that India had the ability to achieve state of the art technology through the combined
efforts of scientific laboratories and academic institutions. He said that if one can liberate India from its
self-created image of being just a fabricating factory to a self-reliant, technologically advanced country,
they can develop indigenously developed technology and attain excellent results.
The Agni team comprised of more than 500 scientists. Agni mission had 2 basic orientation- work and
workers. Different leaders of the group had different ways of getting their work done, some were focused
just on the results and used the workers as tools and others cared too much about getting approval from
the people they working. The result was the integration of good quality work and proper human
relationship.

Involvement, participation and commitment were the key words towards the functioning. Every scientist
was working by their choice the success of Agni was not only their goal but their family’s goal too. VR
Nagraj was one of the scientist working day and night he was not even told by his family that his brother
in law has passed away.

The launch of Agni was scheduled on 20th April 1989. This was going to be an unprecedented exercise.
Unlike space launch, missile launch requires wide ranging Safety Hazardous. Two radars, three Telemetry
station, one telecommand station and four electro-optical tracking systems to monitor missile trajectory.

All activities preparatory to launch were done on schedule. The people living in nearby villages were
moved to another place which resulted into a controversy. There was foreign pressure to abort the
launch but government stood behind them like a rock. As soon as countdown reached T-14 seconds for
the launch there was a ‘hold’ the was rectified and soon there was another hold and after some seconds
there were multiple holds which resulted in to a lot of internal power consumption which gave them no
choice but to abort the launch. VR Nagraj was in tears after being informed about his brother in law and
asked for 3 days break. Kalam managed to inspire the team members to work gain.

The press was up in arms and fielded many interpretations for the delay, cartoonists made fun of it. After
10 days of working round the clock the missile was ready for launch on May 1st 1989 but yet again it
failed and yet again the country made fun of it.

On May 8th 1989 Kalam assembled around 2000 people working on Agni in DRDL-RCI and inspired them
to work again to make this project successful. They worked round the clock for 10 days to fix the problem
faced by the missile in its 2nd launch. The 3rd launch was finally scheduled on 22nd May 1989. The night
before the launch he was walking with Dr Arunachalam, Gen KN Singh and defence minister KC Pant who
came to ITR to witness the launch. They walking by the sea on a full moon night all having the same
question in mind will the Agni succeed tomorrow?

At 0710 hrs the next day the Agni took off it was a perfect launch all flight parameters were met It was
like waking up to a beautiful morning after a nightmarish night. There continuous work of 5 years finally
paid off.