Isro has done fantastic work in the area of providing basic services such as tele-medicine and enhanced weather-forecasting. It should have focussed here rather than enter sectors like ‘inter-planetary explorations’
The Indian Space Research Organisation is always in the news, not because of the Mars Orbiter Mission or the proposed manned mission to space. As Prime Minister Narendra Modi stated on September 24 from the Mission Control Room at Isro’s headquarters at Bangalore, no other wings of the science and technology establishment touches our day-to-day lives like the department of space. We make telephone calls or mobile phone calls and watch hundreds of satellite television channels only because of Isro. Weather forecasting in the country has improved considerably from what it was in the 1960s and 1970s, thanks to the earth observation satellites fabricated and launched by the country’s space agency.
There was a time not long back when weather bulletins broadcast by All India Radio used to be like this: “It may or may not rain for the next three days. There is a possibility of a cyclone or hailstorm in the next couple of days…” No wonder, more than 10,000 people died in the 1979 cyclone which hit the Andhra Pradesh and Odisha coasts. Even the 2004 tsunami caught the country off-guard, resulting in the loss of thousands of lives. Not any more, thanks to remote sensing satellites launched by the Isro. The powerful cameras and sensors in the meteorological and remote-sensing satellites are capable of picking up any abnormalities from the surface of earth, sea or atmosphere on real time basis and send the signals to the monitoring stations. Hence, weather and cyclone forecasting has improved considerably. Cyclone Hudhud is the latest example of the efficacy and accuracy of the data given by the country’s satellites. The Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services at Hyderabad can pick up signals of depression from anywhere in the Bay of Bengal, the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean.
The launch of communication satellites by the space research helped India to revolutionise the country’s education and health sectors to a great extent. Some of the transponders in the communication satellites were used to introduce tele-education services in schools and universities in the country. The shortage of teachers could be addressed by the introduction of tele education facilities. live and interactive class rooms were brought to the homes of students making learning a pleasant experience. This was highlighted by even international TV channels like Discovery and National Geographic.
Yet another innovation brought in by the Isro in association with various hospitals in the country was the tele-medicine services. This helped doctors sitting in super-speciality hospitals in cities to diagnose diseases of people who are hundreds of miles away. Video cameras installed at hospitals in the cities and the clinics or primary health centres in the villages facilitated face-to-face interaction between doctors and patients.
The village resources centres were the offshoots of the communication satellites launched by the Isro. Farmers could find out best the prices for their crops with the help of satellite communication services. But all took a beating from the year 2010, when the Isro’s focus shifted from basic services to sectors like ‘inter-planetary explorations’.
Even after 25 years of research, the space research organisation has not perfected the cryogenic engine which is a must to deploy heavy communication satellites into orbits which are at a height of 36,000km from the earth. Because of the Isro’s failure to develop state-of-the-art cryogenic engines technology, India is dependent on other countries to launch its heavy communication satellites. This was illustrated early December when the Isro carted its heavy Gsat-16 satellite to the European Space Agency’s launchpad at Kouru in French Guyana, from where it was launched into the orbit at an altitude of 36000km, using the heavy-lift Ariane rocket at a cost of `900 crore.
It is because of the Isro’s failure to develop its own cryogenic engine, that we have failed to fully realise our potential in launching heavy-lift vehicles. Though the Isro successfully launched a Geosynchronous Satellite launch Vehicle powered by an indigenously developed cryogenic engine in early January 2014, the mission to launch more GSlVs with ‘desi’ cryogenic engine continues to be limping at a snail’s pace.
The Mangalyaan or the Mars Orbiter Mission helped the Isro to cover up its failure to develop the cryogenic engine. The December 18 launch of the GSlV-Mark III is being portrayed as a major achievement by the country’s space agency. But the GSlV-Mark III had no cryogenic engine in it. Mr K Radhakrishnan, then Irso Chairman, who is also a qualified Kathakali artist and Carnatic musician of national stature, declared that it would take two more years to perfect the cryogenic engine. The media blitzkrieg that India is on the verge of sending a manned mission to space is, by all accounts, far- fetched and not in sync with the existing ground realities.
To claim that India has the cryogenic engine to launch heavy-lift vehicles, is an over-statement of facts. This technology is not available in the market because of the Missile Technology Control Regime instituted by the US. The discriminatory legislation was brought in by a coterie of countries led by the US and which includes France and China. The idea was to prevent India from entering the global launch market which, according to latest figures, is more than $500 billion per year.
India has to show to the world that its GSlV-Mark-III vehicle is foolproof and dependable, before it can think of manned missions to space. The launch vehicle for taking the crew module into the orbit has to be ‘man-rated’. This means that the Isro has to be 99.99 per cent confident of the safety, security and stability of the launch vehicle and the crew module. “All GSlVs launched by the country should follow 99.99 per cent of the flight-path scripted by the space engineers. There can never be a deviation of even one per cent”, a veteran space scientist-cum-engineer and an authority on launch vehicles, remarked.
The manned-mission is more complex and more challenging than that of launching a satellite into space. The passengers (astronauts/cosmonauts) have to be brought back to earth safely. To begin with, the space agency has to select and train astronauts for years to prepare them for the journey to space. The Isro is yet to begin that process.
This is not to under-estimate the achievements made bythe space research agency. It has launched many foreign satellites with its Polar Satellite launch Vehicles. But most of the foreign payloads it deployed into the low Earth Orbit were micro and mini satellites, weighing less than 100kg. The PSlV has emerged as the Isro’s trusted work-horse because of its track record. Till date, it has recorded 27 successive successful launches. What the Isro should do is to establish its capability to launch GSlV missions without failure, before venturing into the advanced terrain of manned missions to space.
India’s track record with the GSlV till date is not satisfactory. It has launched eight GSlV missions, each capable of carrying 2000kg satellites into the 36000 km orbit since 2001. Out of this, six missions were powered by Russian-built cryogenic engines. Though the Isro claims that four of the missions with Russian-built cryogenic engines were successful launches and only two have failed, there are conflicting reports coming from the research organisation. Three of the missions which the Isro claims to be a success, were only partially successful. In manned missions, there can be no partial successes. It can be either be a success or a failure. One cannot gamble with the lives of people who are sent into space.