41 years apart: Rakesh Sharma to Shubhanshu Shukla, India’s astronaut missions compared

Forty-one years apart, there are some similarities and a few differences between the missions of India’s first astronaut, Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma and the upcoming flight into space by Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, which are not only reflective of the technological advances, but also the changing geopolitical alignments.

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Wg Cdr Sharma had flown to the Soviet space station, Salyut-7, with two other Russians on-board the Soviet rocket, Soyuz, in 1984 in the middle of the Cold War between the erstwhile Union of Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) and the United States, and their allies, forming the opposing alliances of Warsaw Pact and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).

That decade was also the high point of India-Russia military ties, particularly the air force, which had inducted frontline fighter aircraft like the MiG-23, MiG-27 and MiG-29, along with the Il-76 and An-32 transport planes and Mi-17 helicopters.

The Indian Navy too saw induction of major Soviet platforms like the Kashin Class destroyers and the Kilo Class submarine, along with the lease of a nuclear powered Charlie Class submarine.

On June 10, 2025, Gp Capt Shukla will travel to the International Space Station (ISS) from an American launch centre on board an American rocket, Falcon-9 as part of the Axion-4 mission with three other crew members from the US, Poland and Hungary.

Both the Indian astronauts are fighter pilots and test pilots from the Indian Air Force. While Sharma was a research astronaut on-board the Soviet mission, Shukla is the designated pilot for the American mission’s spacecraft. Both underwent rigorous selection processes and training abroad to become astronauts.

Between the two journeys beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, there has been a sea change in global power dynamics and the emergence of new players in the economic, military and space domains, which includes India and China.

The USSR collapsed in 1991 and Warsaw Pact ceased to exist and though its successor, Russia, remains a close ally and a top arms supplier to India, there has been growing engagement with the US. The procurement of military equipment from the US over the past two decades has seen a significant increase with platforms such as the C-17 strategic freighter and the C-130 special mission aircraft, Chinook heavy lift helicopters, Apache attack helicopters, Boeing P-8 maritime surveillance aircraft, drones, etc. India is now also looking increasingly towards western suppliers for military equipment.

Also on the table are military-to-military exchanges such as joint training exercises at various levels across all three services and multilateral alliances like the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) for cooperation on economic and security issues. It was only in the mid-1990s that ties with Indo-US ties began moving north and military cooperation prior to that was virtually non-existent.

Coming to the launch vehicles for the two missions, the Falcon-9 is larger, technologically more advanced with automated processes, and can carry heavier payloads than the Soyuz. The Soyuz made its first flight in 1973, while the Falcon-9’s first launch was in 2010. The Falcon is partially reusable, implying that its first stage booster can be recovered and put to use again, while the Soyuz was expendable.

Experiments and scientific studies are part of every astronaut’s mission. Sharma’s work was mainly in the fields of bio-medicine and remote sensing. He conducted an Earth observation program concentrating on India and materials processing experiments.

The scope of Shukla’s mandate under micro-gravity conditions in space is wider. This includes investigating physical and cognitive impact of computer screens, studying growth, metabolism and genetics of microalgae strains, comparing the growth, cellular responses and biochemistry of cyanobacteria strains, identifying pathways of skeletal muscle dysfunction and exploring therapies, examining spaceflight impacts on crop seed, investigating the impacts of spaceflight on germination and growth of crop seeds and identifying molecular mechanisms of resilience in extreme environments.

While Wg Cdr Sharma had spent close to eight days in space, Gp Capt Shukla’s mission is scheduled to be for 14 days. Sharma and his Russian companions had used two different crew capsules, the T-11 for docking and the T-10 for return to Earth, whereas Shukla and his team members would be using the same spacecraft, Dragon C-213 for the to and fro journey.

The orbital altitudes are also vastly different. The Salyut’s altitude above the earth was 219-278 km, while the International Space Station orbits about 400 km. The Salyut’s 9-year mission ended in 1991.

India’s own space programme has come a long way since 1984, when rocket development and satellite launch projects were in their infancy, with missions having limited success. Now the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is a world leader, holding several records and also carrying out commercial satellite launches for other countries.

India has put a spacecraft on the moon, launched missions close to the sun, planned exploration of Mars and is working on a manned space flight. It has its own network of satellites for communications, research and land survey.