Indian Lunar Mission PSLV-C11 booster on a launchpad. After taking off on 22 October 2008, it sucessfully deployed the Chandrayaan-1 space vehicle into lunar orbit on November 8 2008.
Indian cosmonauts in Russian spaceships
Published 02 March, 2009, 15:43
Russia and India are expected to collaborate on launch vehicles for future manned space missions.
India plans to use Russian experience and equipment in its space programme to send a man into orbit, informed Madhavan Nair, the Chairman of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).
Russia and India share a Memorandum of Understanding on Joint Activities in the Field of Human Spaceflight Programme, which was signed during the visit of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to India in 2008.
“We are considering a manned space flight of our own. Russia has vast experience in man-controlled spaceflight which we hope it will share with us to help the Indian space programme. We plan to perform the first Indian space flight on a Russian space vessel,” said Madhavan Nair to the press-service of Russian space corporation Roskosmos, summing up the results of his visit to Russia.
According to Madhavan Nair, in the future, India plans to use space vessels and boosters of its own that would be launched from an Indian cosmodrome.
An Indian-manned mission to space on a Russian spaceship is planned for 2013, which will be followed by a mission on an Indian-made spaceship in 2015.
In 2013, a Russian Soyuz space capsule redesigned for the Indian programme will spend about a week in low orbit with a two-man crew. Later on it will splash down in the Indian Ocean.
Indian space programme
India launched its first satellite Aryabhatta back in 1975, which was followed by another successful launch in 1980.
 First Indian cosmonaut Rakesh Sharma |
The first Indian cosmonaut was Indian Air Force pilot Rakesh Sharma, who went to space aboard a Soviet Soyuz T-11 rocket booster on the spaceship Salyut 7 on April 2 1984, together with two Soviet cosmonauts. He became the 138th man into space. Sharma spent eight days in space conducting multi-spectral photography of northern India in anticipation of the construction of hydroelectric power stations in the Himalayas.
India also plans to conduct a manned mission to the Moon by 2020 and a mission to Mars by 2030.
To conduct all the planned missions ISRO has already set up an astronaut training centre in Bangalore.
In addition, the India-Russia Centre for Technology Transfer was recently established to co-ordinate collaboration in space exploration.
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