India opens research base at Arctic

The station — named Himadri — was inaugurated by Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal and will be managed by the Goa-based National Centre for Antarctic and Ocean Research (NCAOR). NCAOR also runs India’s two research stations in Antarctica.

The opening of the research base comes less than a year after India sent its first-ever scientific expedition to the Arctic, in August last year, to examine whether the environment near the North Pole offered viable research possibilities on issues relevant to Indian science. The week-long tour, led by NCAOR director Rasik Ravindra, was followed by another expedition in March this year. The two teams carried out a number of experiments in the area and based on the encouraging results they obtained, it was decided to set up a permanent station, much like the ones India has in Antarctica.

With the opening of Himadri, India becomes the tenth country, apart from Norway itself, to set up a research base in Ny-Alesund.

Himadri would initially be manned by Indian scientists on a project-to-project basis and later converted to round-the-year station, like the ones in Antarctica.

Owing to almost zero pollution levels, Arctic is generally considered better than Antarctica to carry out research activities.

Antarctica has been home to hundreds of scientists for a number of years now and even attracts some tourists leading to concerns that problems like pollution would soon catch up with the southernmost continent.

India has one operational station in Antarctica, called Maitri, and is in the process of setting up another one this year. India’s first permanent station in Antarctica, Dakshin Gangotri, was set up in 1981.