Car-maker Mercedes-Benz and archaeology experts from Britain and Frace have reportedly evnced interest in salvaging Tipu’s missiles launch site at Srirangapatna. The place is now a stinking empty patch, plastered with cow-dung cake and urine stain….(Click here to read more on it).

A florida-based Mysorean, Mr U B Vasudeva has mailed us the following piece on Tipu’s rocket brigade:

A military tactic developed by Tipu Sultan and his father, Hyder Ali was the use of mass attacks with rocket brigades on infantry formations. Tipu wrote a military manual called 'Fathul Mujahidin' in which 200 rocket men were prescribed to each Mysorean 'cushoon'. (Mysore had 16 to 24 cushoons of infantry). The areas of town where rockets and fireworks were manufactured were known as Taramandal Pet (roughly translated as "Galaxy Bazaar").

The rocket men were trained to launch their rockets at an angle calculated from the diameter of the cylinder and the distance of the target. In addition, wheeled rocket launchers capable of launching five to ten rockets almost simultaneously were used in war. Rockets could be of various sizes, but usually consisted of an tube of soft hammered iron about 8" long and 1½ - 3" diameter, closed at one end and strapped to a shaft of bamboo about 4ft. long. The iron tube acted as a combustion chamber and contained well packed black powder propellant. A rocket carrying about one pound of powder could travel almost 1,000 yards. In contrast, rockets in Europe not being iron cased, could not take large chamber pressures and as a consequence, were not capable of reaching distances anywhere close to a mile.

On 2nd May, 1799, during the siege of Srirangapatnam, a shot struck a magazine of rockets within the fort at Srirangapatnam causing it to explode and sent a towering cloud of black smoke, with cascades of exploding white light, rising up from the battlements. After the fall of Srirangapatnam, 600 launchers, 700 serviceable rockets and 9,000 empty rockets were found. Some of the rockets had iron points or steel blades bound to the bamboo, while some had pierced cylinders, to allow them to act like incendiaries.

Rockets were also used for ceremonial purposes. When the Jacobin Club of Mysore sent a delegation to Tipu, 500 rockets were launched as part of the gun salute.

A study of similar Maratha rockets (at the Battle of Panipat (1761), the British saw salvos of up to 2,000 fired simultaneously against them) at the Royal Woolwich Arsenal led to the publication of A Concise Account of the Origin and Progress of the Rocket System in 1804 by William Congreve, son of the arsenal's commandant. Congreve rockets find mention in the Star Spangled Banner.

Many historians have regarded Tipu's rule as one that fostered secular and liberal views. An interesting aspect of Tipu's life was that he was a founder-member of the Jacobin Club. While accepting the membership, he said of France, "Behold my acknowledgement of the standard of your country, which is dear to me, and to which I am allied; it shall always be supported in my country, as it has been in the Republic, my sister!" He then proceeded to call himself "Citizen Tipu Sultan", a radical shift in the policy of an Indian ruler, among his contemporaries who in general, tolerated no liberal or socialist opinions.