Astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla on Thursday called upon people to take up the responsibility to realise the dream of ‘Viksit Bharat’ (Developed India) by 2047.
Group Captain Shukla, is an Indian Air Force officer and test pilot. He and three other astronauts have been selected and trained to go to the space in India’s first manned mission ‘Gaganyaan’, which is expected to take place in 2027. Addressing a gathering at the Bengaluru Tech Summit, Shukla said, “To realise our dream of Viksit Bharat-2047, my only request to all of you is to take up the responsibility and think ‘How can I take India from here to be a developed nation in 2047’.”
He said, “India will soon have its citizens going to space on an Indian launch rocket in an Indian capsule from Indian soil. “And for that to happen, all of you have to come together and contribute. You have to think about what you can do, how can you enable this to happen – from developing a simple straw to developing a complex life support system – everything is required right now, going into the future.”
Shukla reminded people that India already has 300-plus startups who are actively working in the space domain. According to him, the number of startups is going to grow rapidly and it would take the effort of the entire nation to make this mission happen in the future.
Speaking about how India looks from space, he said the Indian subcontinent is surrounded by three seas – the Bay of Bengal, the Indian Ocean and the Arabian Sea. Shukla completed his maiden space voyage as part of the Axiom-4 mission, a commercial spaceflight supported by ISRO and NASA, and operated by Axiom Space.