India is gearing up for the launch of its first human spaceflight program, Gaganyaan, by the end of this year, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman S. Somanath said. While visiting a Space Expo in Bengaluru, Somanath confirmed that preparations are in full swing for the Gaganyaan mission.
"Gaganyaan is ready for launch, and we are aiming to launch it by the end of this year," Somanath said during the event.
The Union Cabinet recently gave approval to expand the scope of the Gaganyaan program, which includes building the first module of the Bharatiya Antariksh Station. Gaganyaan, approved in December 2018, aims to send humans into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) while establishing the foundation for future Indian human space exploration missions.
In addition to Gaganyaan, ISRO is progressing on its Chandrayaan-4 mission. Somanath shared that the engineering for Chandrayaan-4 is complete, and the Cabinet has granted its approval. However, the mission still requires several layers of approval before moving forward. Unlike Chandrayaan-3, which was primarily focused on soft landing, Chandrayaan-4 will aim to return from the Moon, making it a more complex mission with additional modules and a larger satellite size. The mission will require two launches due to its complexity.
The Cabinet approved Chandrayaan-4 on September 18, with the goal of developing and demonstrating technologies needed for a successful return to Earth after landing on the Moon. The mission will also focus on collecting and analyzing lunar samples. This development is crucial for India’s future plans of landing humans on the Moon by 2040.
Looking ahead, the Indian government has laid out a broader vision for its space program. This includes establishing a Bharatiya Antariksh Station by 2035 and achieving a successful human landing on the Moon by 2040 as part of the nation’s Amrit Kaal space roadmap.
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