With Dr V Narayanan as Isro chairman, space agency gets a combination of satellite and rocket expert

“LPSC is a centre which provides propulsion systems for both rockets and satellites. I feel Narayanan is the first chairman who has a commonality with both systems,” said M Annadurai, the former director of Isro’s satellite centre and mission director for Chandrayaan-1.

From Vikram Sarabhai to V Narayanan

While Vikram Sarabhai who founded Isro in 1963 was a physicist and astronomer, his brief successor M G K Menon was a physicist and Prof Satish Dhawan who took the space agency to new heights was a mathematician and aeronautical engineer. After the founding fathers, the subsequent ISRO chairmen Prof U R Rao (1984-1994) and K Kasturirangan (1994-2003) were primarily experts in satellite technology.

Since 2003, four Isro chairmen — G Madhavan Nair (2003-2009), Dr K Radhakrishnan (2009-2014), K Sivan (2018-2022) and S Somanath (2022-2025) — have been rocket experts who moved from VSSC to the chairman’s post. And, A S Kiran Kumar (2015-2018) was an expert in scientific instruments who moved from the Space Application Centre at Ahmedabad.

“There has been a combination of satellite experts and rocket experts who have been chairmen of ISRO. Dr Narayanan will be the first chairman to have both expertise. The director of LPSC is not purely a rocket expert alone. Satellites also require propulsion power through thrusters. All propulsion systems meant for satellites as well as rockets are done by LPSC. So, in a way LPSC is a common centre for satellites and launch vehicles,” Annadurai said.

Chandrayaan missions

Narayanan, 60, an IIT Kharagpur alumni with a PhD in aerospace engineering, played a key role in designing the propulsion systems on board the Chandrayaan-3. “Chandrayaan was basically a satellite project but he was heading the division because propulsion systems of LPSC also played a major role there,” said Annadurai who worked with Narayanan in building the Chandrayaan propulsion systems.

Experts said one of the primary reasons for the appointment of Narayanan as the new Isro chairman instead of the current VSSC chairman Dr S Unnikrishnan Nair is his role in the success of the agency’s maiden robotic moon landing mission in 2023 with the Chandrayaan-3. Narayanan headed a committee that analysed the causes of the crash of the Chandrayaan-2 mission on the moon in 2019 and devised strategies to overcome the failure.

“We thoroughly studied the problems in Chandrayaan-2 and submitted a report to resolve the problems. The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft was realised after incorporating changes that were recommended and this resulted in the success,” Narayanan said after the Chandrayaan-3 moon landing in 2023.

Narayanan and LPSC also played a role in the development of the cryogenic engines for the LVM3 rocket which launched Chandrayaan-3.