Transformational Trends in India’s Space Programme

India has completed 52 years since it sent into orbit its maiden satellite Aryabhata, an experimental scientific satellite, using a Soviet launch vehicle. Since that modest step, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the national space agency, has passed many eventful milestones. For most part of its journey, it has kept the ethos and inspiration given by Vikram Ambalal Sarabhai, who is considered as the founding father of India’s space programme. He envisioned the national developmental context as a strong focus for developing and using space technology. He also gave the mantra of a self-reliant approach. Within a decade of its formation, ISRO demonstrated its ability to develop its maiden launch vehicle, SLV-3, and its capability to launch objects into space. By the next decade, taking some pioneering steps in the use of the emerging technology of solid-state detectors and through the innovative design of optics for sensors, it launched its first operational Earth observation satellite IRS-1A, with a performance comparable to the globally leading observational spacecraft of the time. The indigenously developed second generation of the geostationary satellite, INSAT-2A, which was launched in 1992, was a step ahead of the first-generation spacecraft. ISRO’s journey over the past five decades has been studded with many such milestones, including the launch in 2008 of Chandrayaan-1, the lunar orbiter that confirmed the presence of water on the Moon’s surface. The successful conduct of the Mars orbiter mission through insertion into a Martian orbit on 24 September 2014 was another notable milestone. ISRO’s first successful launch of the geostationary satellite launch vehicle GSLV was accomplished in 2001. Six key attributes characterise the outcomes of India’s space programmes over these decades, namely the capability for autonomous space access, cost-effectiveness, applications competence, international cooperation, the ability to bring socio-economic impact, and strategic potency.