Chandrayaan-3 touches down safely, let's now touch upon national issues of importance

Wednesday evening saw 140 crore Indians struck by Moon Fever praying to the Almighty for the success of Chandrayaan-3, the Indian Space Research Organisation mission to soft land a rover on the hitherto unexplored south polar region of the lunar surface. As the country watched with bated breath, the lander Vikram made a soft landing on the Moon surface as per the commands sent by India’s space scientists sitting millions of kilometres away in the Bengaluru headquarters. It must be acknowledged that female scientists played a crucial role in manoeuvring the earth's orbit to lunar orbit and then on to the surface of the Moon. It is a commendable achievement, especially when recorded in the backdrop of Russia’s failure to achieve a similar distinction last weekend. What adds to the sweetness of India’s achievement is that the entire mission had a swadeshi aura to it. Our space scientists conceived, designed, built and deployed this inter-planetary mission with indigenous technology. All the countries who congratulated India at this hour of success had denied our scientists the knowhow and materials essential for the space odyssey, citing reasons like Missile Technology Control Regime as they were afraid of our nation overtaking and eclipsing their monopoly in space. The uniqueness of ISRO is its low-cost missions that have made space travel accessible to even poor countries. The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle and Geosynchronous  Satellite Launch Vehicle developed by India have brought down the cost of space missions manifold and this has put a question mark on the monopoly of other space-faring nations.

Congratulating the space scientists for doing the country proud, Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared that Gaganyaan (manned mission to space) and Shukrayaan (mission to Venus) are on anvil. Though these declarations are music to years, one should not forget the fact that India is still far away from NASA, ESA and the Russian Space Agency. Team ISRO is yet to perfect its heavy-duty GSLV though the last couple of missions were successful. It may be a strange paradox, but the truth is that the country which is yet to develop a civilian aircraft is dreaming of designing and building spacecraft to send human beings into space. Yes, India has not developed a transport aircraft of its own to date. There are other inherent drawbacks, too. We do not have a desi motor car of our own, though India is credited with building the world's least costly car. The pluralism about which our leaders are so vocal has gone only as far as to mean pluralistic weather; while one part of India gets inundated in flood, the other part is parched for drinking water. It is these issues which we should address. While the rover on board Vikram, the spacecraft, would hold a probe into the presence of water on the lunar surface, back home Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are engaged in a battle for water from Kaveri. The real Amritkaal will become a reality only when these problems are addressed.