India's lofty space ambitions

Amid a plethora of bad news, ranging from natural calamities to avoidable aircrashes with planes running into hills down to oil tankers attacked in the high seas comes the news of India’s lofty space ambitions. It was a breath of fresh air as Isro spelt out its ambitious plan of an orbiter, lander and rover on the moon and a mini-space station as a platform for explorations. As a pioneer of low-cost space technology, even India’s $2.6 trillion economy can afford the joy of space rides. After all, didn’t Isro run the Mangalyaan mission in 2014 for just Rs 518 crores, compared to Nasa’s stupendous Rs 4,697 crores for the Mars Rover? The budget was less than what Hollywood burnt in making the award-winning film Gravity.

The immediate focus is on the moon, Earth’s closest neighbour. A date in mid-July has been set for the complex mission. Nasa is planning to put an astronaut on the moon again, although one man who doesn’t get the significance of exploring our own satellite further is US President Donald Trump, who said: “We did that 50 years ago. They should be focused on much bigger things, including Mars (of which the moon is a part), defence and science!” It’s not as if Nasa would shut plans for a lunar outpost by 2024 as Mr Trump may not be taken all that seriously on space matters. If man did not explore space, would we have such life-changing technologies like one that makes possible for technology to run our mobile communications platform? Considering that India discovered water on the moon, extensive lunar explorations should not be given up even as we send probes way beyond in space.