TOPIC:-AN SHORT STORY ON ISRO-A JOURNEY FROM IMPOSSIBLE TO POSSIBLE
INDIAN SPACE RESERACH ORGANIZATION(ISRO)
On April 1st 2019, the Indian Space Research Organization — ISRO — deployed an intelligence satellite EMISAT along with 28 customer satellites. This April launch comes two years after ISRO launched a record breaking 104 satellites on a single rocket, an event that both the international news media and the space community looked at very carefully.
Since its conception in 1969, ISRO has completed a total of 185 missions and is fast becoming one of the most effective and competitive space agencies in the world. It has also become an important cog in the wheel of India’s future prosperity, and technological and scientific progress. Indian Space Program began in an era when the country was rife with internal problems of poverty, hunger, and illiteracy.
So how did ISRO manage to make it one of the most successful Space Programs on the planet?
Before we get into that, what is a successful space program? To build a working space program, you need these three basic things:
1. Satellites — they orbit the earth and provide information gathering and communication capabilities.
2. Launch Vehicles — you need something to breakthrough the earth’s gravitational pull. Launch Vehicles are rockets that do just that by using different kinds of fuels.
3. Ground Infrastructure — infrastructure is needed to launch and communicate with the satellites. This includes launch sites and communication centers.
With that in mind, let’s have a look at the history of ISRO. History ISRO was formed in 1969 with two broad aims First — application of space assets in helping the development of the country, and secondly- achieving self-reliance in manufacturing and launching capabilities. In fact, the very first experiments ISRO did were in areas of remote sensing — where they successfully detected diseases in crops, and telecommunications — using satellites to broadcast educational programs to rural parts of the country.
Broadly speaking, Indian space odyssey can be divided into 4 phases.
The first phase started in 1962 with the creation of Indian National Committee for Space Research (INCOSPAR). During this phase the reasons for developing a space program and its future course were spelled out. It was Vikram Sarabhai’s vision to start India’s space program as a means to uplift the then socio-economic poor country, that led to its early success.
In 1963, with the help of the United States, the Soviet Union, and France — Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS) was set up in Kerala and in the same year a US made rocket Nike Apache was launched to 200 km. This marked India’s entry into space which led to the country launching its very first sounding rockets Rohini in 1969 and in the same year INCOSPAR was superseded by ISRO.
In the 70s and the 80s, the space program started it second phase — which was consolidation of the plans that were set up in the first phase and a lot of experiments. During this time the various applications of potential satellites were thoroughly tested
THIS STORY WAS WRITTEN BY
AKSHARAA.S
FROM CHENNAI
