INDIA’S Chandrayaan-3 mission is in its final stages of launch. The team engaged in preparations for the launch is working hard to meet the mid-July target on the strength of India’s heaviest rocket launch vehicle Mark-III. The moon has been a source of imagination and inspiration for poets and lovers for centuries. Today, scientists want to make it a home and a means of meeting the needs of mankind.
According to ISRO officials, the mission is being sent to test India’s ability to land safely on the lunar surface. Chandrayaan-2 mission failed in its last stage as its lander collided with the lunar surface, after which it lost contact with the earth’s control room.
Chandrayaan-3 is being sent to complete the mission. After landing on the lunar surface, the rover will come out, revolve around the surface, and carry out various tests. Now that the final round of trials is underway, all the preparations for the launch have been made. If the mission is successful, India will become the fourth country to have the technology to do a soft-landing on the moon. It will bring India on a par with China, America, and Russia. India began its moon odyssey on November 18, 2008, with Chandrayaan-1 and its scientists have come a long, and courageous, way in the field of space since Independence.
ISRO scientists have accepted multiple challenges, showing indomitable courage continually. They have kept moving forward with new discoveries. Today, the Indian Space Research Organisaion is one of the six largest space agencies in the world. Learning from the mistakes made in Chandrayaan-2, ISRO scientists have made significant changes in Chandrayaan-3 so that it can land on lunar surface without any hiccups. A noteworthy thing is that the agency has given the same names to the lander and rover of Chandrayaan-3 as it did to the lander and rover of Chandrayaan-2. The lander will be named Vikram, after the father of the Indian space programme Vikram Sarabhai, and the rover will be called Pragyan.
At the time of the failure of the Chandrayaan-2 mission, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had hugged the then ISRO chief K Sivan, patted him on the back, and told the scientists that there are no failures in science; there are only experiments from which something is always extracted. “Today’s learning will make us stronger and better,” he had said, adding, “The best is yet to come in our space programme. India is with you.”
After the success of the Chandrayaan-3 mission, scientists will be able to get more information about the moon, the only natural satellite of the earth. Such instruments will be sent along with Chandrayaan-3 that will conduct many important tests, including the study of the lunar rocky surface layer, lunar earthquakes, the thermal physical properties of the lunar surface plasma, and its basic composition. Today, the US, Russia, and China are competing to establish their supremacy in space and ISRO is confident that India will be a leading nation in this field by 2047, when it completes hundred years of Independence. And for that to happen, we have to see space as a strategic asset, build our capacity, and make ourselves self-reliant.
