India's Road Map For Space Developments Set Till 2047: New ISRO Chief V Narayanan

The new ISRO chief V Narayanan said India will fly humans to space by 2026 as part of the Gaganyaan mission. Gaganyaan envisages launching a crew of three members to an orbit of 400 kilometres for a three-days-long mission and bring them back safely to earth, by landing in Indian sea waters.

Speaking to NDTV, Dr Narayanan said that Gaganyaan is a high priority project for ISRO and that the rocket that will ferry Gaganyatris is now human-rated. Last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the four astronauts who have been selected for the Gaganyaan Mission - Prashanth Nair, Angad Prathap, Ajit Krishnan, and Shubhanshu Shukla.

Adding that a Bharatiya Antriksh Station will be in place by 2035, he said that India has a clear road map for space developments till 2047. Further, an Indian will land on the Moon by 2040, Dr Narayanan said a day before he will step in as the new ISRO chief.

Credited with developing the cryogenic engine technology when it was denied to India, Dr Narayanan said it is very hard to master. Before the Department of Space chose him as current ISRO chief S Somanath's successor, Dr Narayanan was the Director of the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre at ISRO. On the day of the announcement of his elevation, he told NDTV from Thiruvananthapuram, "We have a clear roadmap for India and I hope to take ISRO to greater heights as we have great talent."

He led the human rating of the Launch Vehicle Mark-3 (LVM3) or the Bahubali rocket, which will fly humans into space. LVM3 is configured as a three stage vehicle with two solid strap-on motors (S200), one liquid core stage (L110) and a high thrust cryogenic upper stage (C25). The S200 solid motor is among the largest solid boosters in the world with 204 tonnes of solid propellant.

In September last year, the Union Cabinet had approved the Chandrayaan-4 mission to the Moon. This mission aims to develop and demonstrate technologies to return to Earth after a successful lunar landing, as well as collect and analyse Moon samples on Earth. The Chandrayaan-4 mission will achieve foundational technologies and capabilities needed for an eventual Indian landing on the Moon (planned by 2040) and a safe return to Earth. Key technologies for docking, undocking, landing, safe return, and lunar sample collection and analysis will be demonstrated.

In the latest from ISRO, two Indian satellites came as close as three metres on Sunday in a trial attempt for space docking and then moved back, the Indian space agency said. "A trial attempt to reach up to 15 m and further to 3 m is done. Moving back spacecrafts to safe distance. The docking process will be done after analysing data further," the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in its latest update on the Space Docking Experiment (SpaDeX) mission, which aims to achieve an "exciting handshake" in space.