The Indian Army on Thursday launched a new messaging application called ASIGMA for in-house communication. ASIGMA, which stands for Army Secure IndiGenous Messaging Application, has been developed entirely in-house by a team of officers of the Corps of Signals, an official statement said.

"The new application is being deployed on the Army's internal network as a replacement of Army Wide Area Network (AWAN) messaging application which has been in service for the past 15 years," the Army said.

ASIGMA has been fielded on Army-owned hardware and lends itself to lifetime support with future upgrades, it said.

The bespoke messaging application meets all futuristic user requirements and boasts of an enhanced user experience, the statement mentioned.

ASIGMA has a variety of contemporary features, including multi-level security, message prioritisation and tracking, dynamic global address book and various options to meet the Army's requirements, it noted.

"This future ready messaging application will meet real time data transfer and messaging requirements of the Army, especially in the backdrop of current geo political security environment and is in line with the government of India's Make in India initiative," the statement said.

The Indian Army has braced automation in a major way, especially after the COVID-19 outbreak, and is taking substantial steps towards paperless functioning, it said.

"ASIGMA will further boost these efforts and will add to the host of other applications already being employed by the Army over its captive pan Army network," it added.