A memorable black-and-white photograph from the early days of the Indian space programme shows the nose cone of a small rocket being taken to the launchpad on the carrier rack of a bicycle. It’s an incongruous sight. All around the bicycle is the dusty, palm-bedecked rural India of the 1960s. Cut to 2023, and the image of a jubilant S. Somanath, Chairman, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), declaring, “We have achieved soft-landing on the moon. India is on the moon.”

In the slow yet eventful decades separating the two images, the space programme evolved from what many perceived as the frivolous aspirations of an upstart, poverty-stricken third-world country to a sparkling example of scientific excellence that Indians can look up to. Truth is, the ISRO had made it to the elite space club much before the Chandrayaan-3 mission’s ‘Vikram’ lander touched down on the lunar south pole on August 23. The space agency has proved its capabilities time and again by placing satellites in precise orbits on modest budgets and embarking upon highly publicised missions to the moon (in 2008 and 2019) and Mars (in 2014).

In 2017, the ISRO turned up the heat on the space race by launching 104 satellites in one go on the 39th flight of its trusted Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). But beyond such immediately visible, high-profile achievements are the countless ways in which the ISRO and its home-grown technologies have touched the lives of the common people; be it weather forecasts, telemedicine, navigation or tele-education. It is this connect with the grassroots that has made ISRO a household name.

Second to none

Vikram Sarabhai, the driving spirit behind India’s space ambitions, was keen for India to be “second to none in the application of advanced technologies to the real problems of man and society which we find in our country.” To him, the application of sophisticated technologies and methods of analysis “to our problems is not to be confused with embarking on grandiose schemes whose primary impact is for show rather than for progress measured in hard economic and social terms.” This is perhaps why it did not surprise anyone when the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), ISRO’s lead facility responsible for launch vehicles, including the hefty LVM3 which put Chandrayaan-3 in orbit last July, turned its skills to developing mechanical ventilators in the bleak days of the COVID-19 pandemic. But then, the beginnings of ISRO too were modest; on land relinquished by the fishing community and a local church in a little-known coastal village in Kerala’s Thiruvananthapuram.

“A historic landmark in the entire process of land acquisition was the singular act of grace on the part of the Christian community at Thumba and the bishop of Thiruvananthapuram Rt Rev. Dr. Peter Bernard Pereira, in 1962. The venerated place of worship (the St. Mary Magdalene Church, now a popular space museum) was graciously laid at the altar of science,’’ the book A Brief History of Rocketry in ISRO, by P. V. Manoranjan Rao and P. Radhakrishnan, veterans of the space agency, notes. On November 21 this year, it will be 60 years since the first sounding rocket, an American-made Nike-Apache, lifted off from Thumba. Five years after that event, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, in 1968, dedicated the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS) to the UN.

Over the years, the space agency has had its ups and downs. The occasional mission setbacks aside, the ISRO was rocked by the spy scandal in the early 1990s and the Antrix-Devas case later on. Nevertheless, the agency has always displayed an ability to bounce back stronger. Today, the ISRO, with its many facilities spread over the country, has a pride of place among India’s government establishments. In the midst of institutions bogged down by laidback attitudes to work and bureaucratic lethargy, it is seen as one of the rare ones that can ‘’deliver.’’

By indigenously developing technologies like the cryogenic rocket engine and the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS – NavIC), often in the face of sanctions, it has demonstrated to the country’s larger scientific community that such things are not the exclusive, impregnable domains of the West alone.

Perhaps, this is ISRO’s greatest contribution to the country’s scientific community; a ‘work culture’, epitomised by an unwavering commitment to excellence and teamwork that can be traced back to the days of Sarabhai, Satish Dhawan and A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

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A dish antenna is seen inside the ISRO Telemetry Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) facility on August 23, 2023 in Bengaluru.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

With Vikram, the lander module of Chandrayaan-3, successfully landing on the surface of moon on August 23, the focus has now moved to the rover in its belly, Pragyan.

The officials at the Mission Operations Complex (MOX) at ISRO Telemetry, Tracking, and Command Network (ISTRAC) are readying to roll out the rover, which will carry out in-situ chemical analysis of the lunar surface during the course of its mobility.

“The Pragyan rover may come out in the next few hours or it may take one day also to come out depending on the conditions,” ISRO Chairman S. Somanath said.

He said that once out, the rover would carry out two important experiments. It has two payloads — the LASER Induced Breakdown Spectroscope (LIBS) and the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS). The objectives of the LIBS are to conduct qualitative and quantitative elemental analysis and to derive the chemical composition and infer mineralogical composition to further our understanding of the lunar surface.

The APXS will determine the elemental composition of lunar soil and rocks around the landing site.

The team behind Chandrayan-3’s success

Soon after the ISRO achieved the historic feat of landing on the lunar south pole, Mr. Somanth introduced the key members who enabled India to achieve the task flawlessly.

P. Veeramuthuvel, Project Director, Chandrayaan-3, said, “It is a great moment of happiness, it gives me immense satisfaction on achieving this goal as Project Director of this mission. The entire mission operations from launch till landing happened flawlessly as per the timeline and we have become the fourth country to demonstrate the soft landing on the moon and the first country to go to the south pole of the moon.”

Sreekanth, Mission Director, Chandrayaan-3, said, “It gives me immense pleasure to be part of Chandrayaan-3 and as Mission Director, I would like to thank each and every team member who has supported in carrying out all the mission operations flawlessly.”

Calling it a memorable moment, Kalpana K., Associate Project Director, Chandrayaan-3 said, “We have achieved our goal flawlessly after rebuilding our spacecraft. It has been breath in and out for our team.”

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M. Sankaran, Director of U.R. Rao Satellite Centre, said, “Today we have achieved what we set out to achieve in 2019. It was delayed by four years but we have done it.” He was referring to the failed landing of Chandrayaan-2 in 2019.

The Lander Module (LM) successfully underwent a deboosting operation that reduced its orbit to 113 km x 157 km.
| Photo Credit: Twitter/@isro

A day after the lander module (LM) separated from the propulsion module (PM) , it successfully underwent a deboosting operation on August 18.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said that the LM successfully underwent a deboosting operation that reduced its orbit to 113 km x 157 km.

Also read: ISRO releases two videos of the Moon on August 18 

The space agency plans to carry out the second deboosting operation on August 20, 2023.

“The second deboosting operation is scheduled for August 20, 2023, around 0200 Hrs. IST,” it said after the first deboosting operation.

The lander is expected to touch down on the moon surface on August 23, 2023 at 5.47 p.m.

On August 17 the propulsion module and the lander module successfully separated and embarked on their respective journeys.

The Chandrayaan-3 consists of a lander module, a propulsion module and a rover.

The lander will have the capability to soft land at a specified lunar site and deploy the Rover, which will carry out in-situ chemical analysis of the lunar surface during the course of its mobility. The lander and the rover have scientific payloads to carry out experiments on the lunar surface.

The main function of the propulsion module is to carry the lander module from launch vehicle injection till final lunar 100 km circular polar orbit and separate the Lander Module from the propulsion module.

The propulsion module also has one scientific payload as a value addition which will be operated post-separation of the lander module. The payload will be operational for a period of three to six months. The lander and the rover have a mission life of one lunar day (14 Earth days).