India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, has announced the successful test of the country’s first space weapon, an anti-satellite missile, in a surprise televised address in the middle of the election campaign.
The dramatic nature of the announcement – during a caretaker period when governments are restricted in what they promote – drew criticism alongside praise for India’s space scientists.
Modi said on Wednesday morning that India was the fourth country to acquire the ability to shoot down satellites, after the US, Russia and China.
“Some time back, our scientists have hit a live satellite 300km away in low-Earth orbit,” Modi said, hailing the indigenously produced receptor as a major step forward for the country’s national security. “India has made an unprecedented achievement today,” he said. “India registered its name as a space power.”
The sudden news that Modi was going to speak on Wednesday morning led to speculation of a major national security development, just weeks after the country exchanged tit-for-tat airstrikes with its neighbour Pakistan.
Some on social media joked about needing to stockpile money, a reference to Modi’s surprise announcement in November 2016 that he was cancelling India’s two most valuable banknotes, a move that sparked months of cash shortages.
An anchor on the news channel NDTV described the space announcement as “somewhat of an anticlimax”, while the veteran broadcaster Shekhar Gupta tweeted that the space missile had destroyed two targets: a satellite, and “what remained of the stature [and] reputation of Election Commission of India”, the independent agency that regulates party conduct during campaigns.
The announcement was quickly trumpeted by the ruling Bharatiya Janata party. “The truth is, our proficient scientists always had the talent and capability, all that was needed was the go-ahead from the government,” wrote Amit Shah, the party’s president, on Twitter.
Rahul Gandhi, the main opposition leader, congratulated India’s defence research agency on the launch. “I would also like to wish the PM a very happy World Theatre Day,” he added in a tweet.
India has a thriving space programme that launched a record number of satellites in a single mission in 2017. The country is currently developing a plan to launch a manned space mission in 2022.
Anti-satellite missiles were first tested by the US in 1959. The USSR devised similar technology in tests over the next two decades, but the race to develop the armament was kickstarted again in 2007 when China deployed its own version.
The weapon gives a country the ability to destroy an enemy’s satellites, potentially disrupting capabilities in agriculture, defence, navigation and communication. It has never been used in combat.
India’s ministry of external affairs said the country had “no intention of entering into an arms race in outer space”.
“We have always maintained that space must be used only for peaceful purposes,” it said in a statement. “We are against the weaponisation of outer space and support international efforts to reinforce the safety and security of space-based assets.”
