In October 2008 India launched its first lunar probe Chandrayaan – 1. Chandrayaan is a Sanskrit word and translates to Moon Vehicle in English. I was deputed in Melbourne Australia in 2008, one of my colleagues from Sri Lanka questioned me why India spends money on space missions, he was trying to make a point that India should not be wasting money on space missions. The logical answer that came to mind which I told him was that may be India wants to get into space technology early rather than importing it at an expensive price later.
Chandrayaan – 1 was a partial success, its major achievement was the discovery of the widespread presence of water molecules in the lunar soil. Since then Sri Lanka had been trying to set up its own space agency with help of United Kingdom and China.
India’s spending on space mission has been criticized as if India spends a fortune on it. Top critics have been United Kingdom and India’s neighbors like Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Little they know that India’s space missions are most cost effective. When India’s GSLV launch failed in 2010, Salman Taseer (Governor Pakistan Punjab) twitted below lines:
“Why does India make fools of themselves messing in space technology (GSLV)? Stick 2 bollywood my advice”
Pakistan had started its space program in 1961 but they lost the track and now a days rely on China for launching satellites. There is an increasing pressure in Pakistan to revive its space program since the success and wide spread international media coverage of India’s Mars mission.
India’s love for space technology comes from its mythology and culture. India has many mythological stories that talk about space travel, time travel and spending time in space.
One such story that introduced me to theory of relativity before I learnt it in school is the story of King Muchukunda.