Solar mission: ISRO's Aditya-L1 will reach its destination early next month, says Union Minister Jitendra Singh

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 18

Aditya-L1, India’s first solar mission, will reach its destination Lagrange Point 1 early next month, to be precise, around the first week of January 2024, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said on Monday.

Meanwhile, ISRO will conduct a series of tests related to India’s maiden human space mission, Gaganyaan, in the course of the next year, he said.

Singh said these strides have been possible due to the enabling milieu created by opening up India's space sector to private players which in turn has elicited an overwhelming response from start-ups and industry.

With the unlocking of Space Technology, Jitendra Singh said, the common masses have been able to witness the launch of the mega space events like Chandrayaan-3 and Aditya. Over 10,000 people came to see Aditya launch.

India has witnessed investments of over Rs 1,000 crore in space start-ups in the last nine months of the current financial year from April to December 2023, the minister added.

“From just one start-up in the space sector four years back, we have almost 190 private space start-ups after opening up of the sector and the earlier ones of them have now turned entrepreneurs,” he said.

Jitendra Singh said, although the Indian Space programme started late, about the time when the leading space faring nations were racing to the Moon, today the world is eagerly awaiting Chandrayaan-3 studies which landed on the virgin South Polar region of Moon.

“During PM Modi’s visit to Washington, NASA made a proposal to send an Indian astronaut to the International Space Station (ISS), that is likely to materialize next year,” he said, adding that space research now touches every person’s life in one way or the other.

Pointing out that about 50-60 per cent of NASA’s projects come from private funding, Singh said the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (NRF), which will have about 70 per cent funding from non-government sources, will pave the way for the PPP model in India’s S&T goals.

“If we have to achieve global standards, our parameters and our yardstick have to be global,” he said.

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