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India and France stepped up their engagement in the space sector after the two countries announced an ambitious joint vision over the weekend, outlining collaboration on inter-planetary missions, including exploration of the Moon, Mars and Venus, manned space flights, and maritime surveillance.
The "India-France Joint Vision for Space Cooperation" document was released after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron met in New Delhi and announced a slew of deals worth billions of dollars, ranging from security to energy.
As part of the vision document, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and the French National Space Agency (CNES) will collaborate on a range of space technologies, including the development of satellites, inter-planetary rovers, the imaging of Earth, space transportation and, most significantly, “human exploration of the universe.”
"From the ground to the sky, there is no subject on which India and France are not working together," said Modi.
The plans were listed in two agreements signed by ISRO chairman K Sivan and CNES President Jean-Yves LeGall in New Delhi on Saturday.
The joint vision said that “ISRO and CNES would jointly develop capabilities and critical technologies addressing for radiation shielding solutions; personnel hygiene and waste management system; and design of man-in-loop simulators
for human space flight as well as bioastronautics,” towards developing technologies for human exploration of the universe.
Exploring the solar system and beyond
Setting its eye on exploring the solar system and beyond, the vision document stated: "ISRO and CNES would work together on autonomous navigation of rovers in Moon, Mars and other planets, aero braking technologies for planetary exploration, modelling of Mars and Venus atmosphere and inflatable systems for Venus exploration. Both sides can embark on complex high technology space science and planetary exploration missions in future."
According to the document, France's CNES will offer navigational support to India's ISRO for future moon rovers, and both the agencies will jointly work on the modeling of Mars and Venus atmospheres. “Both agencies will study the possibility of embarking French science instruments on board the future interplanetary (Moon, Mars and asteroids) Indian missions.”
Adding a security dimension to the pact, the vision document explicitly mentioned its objective of maritime surveillance. “ISRO and CNES would work together for the design and development of joint products and techniques to monitor and protect the assets in land and sea. In particular, both sides will pursue the study of a constellation of satellites for maritime surveillance,” read the document.
“The agencies would also cooperate to protect their respective space based assets, including by infrastructure and information sharing on space events and India and France will also develop a wider dialogue on space situational awareness,” it added.
“That India was committing to the development of a joint constellation of satellites with another country for the first time, showed the deep trust shared between New Delhi and Paris,” wrote Pallav Bagla, the science editor at India's NDTV news channel.
The document also envisioned a satellite called “Trishna,” or thirst in Sanskrit and Hindi, to map water resources on Earth.
Welcoming the joint statement, former ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan told NDTV that it was a "major and positive step forward towards an Indian astronaut program," especially since both countries have had strong and fruitful cooperation both in space technology development and space commerce in the last five decades.
India has so far committed about 23 million US dollars for the development of critical technologies needed for manned space missions but experts at ISRO told NDTV that they would need between three to four billion US dollars to put an “Indian in space, on an Indian rocket from Indian soil” – a process that could take seven to 10 years.
The first and last Indian to fly into space was Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma in 1984 on a Soviet mission. Since then, two American women astronauts of Indian origin, Kalpana Chawla and Sunita Williams, have taken space flights on US missions.
ISRO aims for its second lunar mission in April
ISRO on Sunday said that it is aiming for an April launch of the Chandrayaan-2 satellite to the Moon. The agency’s second mission to Moon will include a rover to explore the lunar surface, according to a report from Press Trust of India.
We are aiming for the launch of Chandrayaan-2 in April. In case we are unable to do so, then we will try for a launch by October," ISRO chairman K Sivan told reporters.
The Chandrayaan-2 satellite would include an orbiter, lander and six-wheeled rover which would move around the landing site and instruments on it would send back data that would be useful in analyzing the lunar soil.
ISRO launched Chandrayaan-1, its first successful mission to the Moon, in 2008 and involved a lunar orbiter and a probe.
Six years later, the Indian space agency made quite a stir by successfully sending its Mangalyaan orbiter to Mars on a shoestring budget of 74 million US dollars, making India the first nation in the world to do so on its first attempt.
Modi famously said that even the 2013 Hollywood space thriller “Gravity” – released the same year that the Mangalyaan was launched – had a larger budget at about 100 million US dollars.
(CGTN)
