Also: Indian Space Research Organisation, Chandrayaan, Gaganyaan, Aditya-L1, PSLV, GSLV
Definition
India's national space agency, founded in 1969 and headquartered in Bengaluru, which builds and launches satellites and rockets, conducts planetary and solar missions, and is developing India's human spaceflight programme.
Deep-dive lesson:Space and Nuclear Programmes of India. This page is a quick reference that connects the term across subjects; read the lesson for the full treatment.
India's space programme began with a modest rocket launch from Thumba, near Thiruvananthapuram, in November 1963, with parts carried on bicycles and a bullock cart. Vikram Sarabhai, the physicist who led the Indian National Committee for Space Research (INCOSPAR), argued that a developing country needed space technology not for prestige but to solve real problems: communication, weather forecasting, education and resource mapping. ISRO was formed in 1969, and the Department of Space and the Space Commission were set up in 1972.
India's first satellite, Aryabhata, was launched by a Soviet rocket in 1975. The SLV-3, under A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's leadership, placed the Rohini satellite in orbit in 1980, making India a spacefaring nation with its own launch capability. Over the following decades, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) became a reliable workhorse, the INSAT and GSAT series supported communication and broadcasting, and the IRS series provided remote sensing. After sanctions in the 1990s limited access to cryogenic technology, India developed its own cryogenic engines for the GSLV.
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