Journalism of Courage
Speaking at a Human Space Flight Expo in Bengaluru on Thursday, ISRO Chairman S Somanath said India’s human spaceflight programme, Gaganyaan, would be successful by the end of next year, adding that the country should be able to make space a permanent habitat after 25 years.
“Astronauts are undergoing training and they are back from Russia. In the next one year, they will be undergoing many theoretical, experimental, simulation activities and will be trained in specific skills related to the mission… There was an important crew module and propulsion module test that was conducted recently. We are also planning to do a revised crew abort system—a process of aborting the mission in case of an emergency—using a test vehicle which will be flagged off to Sriharikota for launch in two or three days. We hope that all our tests will go successfully and be able to meet the target by the end of 2023,” said Somanath.
Somanath said it was important to make outer space habitable to humans. “There is no guarantee that life on the earth won’t go extinct in the future. As human beings, we are not ready to go extinct. It is in this direction that it is important to tap the space and rocket technology to overcome the gravity of the earth and travel to space and make it habitable for life to thrive,” he said.
However, the ISRO chief said, India still needs to explore more in space. “In fact, if you don’t put your foot on the moon or Mars today, it will be denied to you in future. Hence it is our responsibility to create the technological capabilities now and be able to travel to space and live there. It is my dream that after India crosses 100 years of independence, we must be able to make space a permanent habitat for Indians,” he said.
Earlier at the Jawaharlal Nehru planetarium, Somanath inaugurated the exhibition featuring an interactive model of the Ganganyaan mission, scaled models of launch vehicles, satellites, a crew module, a space suit, a space toilet, the Mars rover and an interactive model of the thermal control system.
It will have a sky theatre, which will screen The Indian Space Odyssey- Sounding Rockets to Gaganyaan, a film chronicling the evolution of India’s space research agency over the past six decades.
The exhibition, which will go on till Sunday, will also have live lecturers and demonstrations on Gaganyaan, satellite communication, space exploration and other topics.
