Indian Army conducts Exercise Skylight to test resilience of its satellite communications

Source: The post is based on the article “Indian Army conducts Exercise Skylight to test resilience of its satellite communications” published in The Hindu on 6th August 2022.

What is the News?

Indian Army has conducted a major pan-India Exercise codenamed ‘Skylight’.

What is Exercise Skylight?

Conducted by: Indian Army

Aim: To test the operational readiness and robustness of its satellite communication systems in the event of an attack by an adversary.

Does the Indian Army have its own dedicated satellite?

The Indian Army uses the services of a number of ISRO satellites that connect hundreds of communication terminals of various types.

Unlike the Indian Air Force and the Navy, the Indian Army currently does not have a dedicated satellite.

Indian Army Satellite by 2025

The Defence Acquisition Council has cleared a proposal for a GSAT-7B communications satellite. With this, the Indian Army is on course to get its own satellite by December 2025.

Note: GSAT 7 satellites are advanced satellites developed by the Indian Space Research Organization(ISRO) to meet the communication needs of the defence services.