NEW DELHI - India's ballistic missile defense shield is ready for deployment and it can be put in place at short notice, a top military scientist said Sunday.

"The ballistic missile defense shield is now mature. We are ready to put phase one in place and it can be put in very short time," the chief of India's Defense Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), VK Saraswat, told the media in the national capital.

The DRDO has developed the missile shield and it has been successfully tested on an incoming missile with s range of 2,000 kilometers.

The scientist said that as of now the shield can be put in place to protect at least two cities in the country. "However, the places have not been identified," he said.

The DRDO chief said that in the second phase, the shield would be capable of intercepting and destroying an incoming missile with a range of 5,000 kms. "This phase will be ready by 2016," he added.