The Indian Space Programme
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Figure 10‑10 RLV-TD at Launch. 23 May 2016. Credit ISRO
Figure 10‑11 RLV-TD as Tracked by Ship, Satellite and Ground Station at Sriharikota. Credit ISRO
Figure 10‑12 NASA X-43 Scramjet versus Traditional Jet Engine. Credit NASA
Figure 10‑13 Advanced Technology Vehicle Development Flight. One of the Two Passive Scramjets Can Be Seen in the Middle of the Launch Vehicle. 3 March 2010. Credit ISRO
Figure 11‑1 Cryogenic Engine CE25 used on GSLV Mk3. Credit ISRO
Figure 11‑2 GSLV Mk3 with Second VAB in construction in background. June 2017. Credit ISRO
Figure 12‑1 Aryabhata Prior to Assembly. Credit ISRO
Figure 12‑2 Professor U.R. Rao. August 2013. Credit Author
Figure 12‑3 Bhaskara-1 Undergoing Testing in 1979. Credit ISRO
Figure 12‑4 APPLE Electromagnetic testing on Bullock Cart 1981. Credit ISRO
Figure 12‑5 INSAT-1B at the Kennedy Space Centre. 2 June 1983. Credit NASA
Figure 12‑6 COSPAS-SARSAT System. Credit COSPAS-SARSAT
Figure 13‑1 IRNSS Ground Segment. Credit ISRO
Figure 13‑2 IRNSS Architecture. Credit ISRO
Figure 13‑3 IRNSS Subsystems Showing the Central Location of the Corner Cubes. Credit ISRO
Figure 13‑4 IRNSS-1A. Credit ISRO
Figure 13‑5 Mount Abu Satellite Laser Ranging Station. Credit ISRO
Figure 13‑6 GAGAN Ground Stations. Credit Airports Authority of India
Figure 13‑7 Satellite-Based Augmentation Systems. Credit ESA
Figure 14‑1 Soviet-Indian prime and backup crew from left- Yuri Malyshev, Ravish Malhotra, Rakesh Sharma, Georgi Grechko, Anatoly Berezov and Gennady Strekalov. Credit Sputnik
Figure 14‑2 Soyuz Capsule Abort System that Helped Gennady Strekalov Survive a Launch Failure Six Months before His Flight with Sharma. Credit NASA
Figure 14‑3 Crew of Soyuz T-11 in Star City. (Right to left) Gennady Strekalov, Yuri Malyshev, Rakesh Sharma, Ravish Malhotra and Sharma’s wife, Madhu. 15 April 1984. Credit Sputnik
Figure 14‑4 Rakesh Sharma with Hero of the Soviet Union and The Order of Lenin Awarded by the USSR. August 2013. Credit Author
Figure 14‑5 N.C. Bhat and P. Radhakrishnan. Credit Bert Viz
Figure 14‑6 P. Radhakrishnan (back row third from left) and N. C. Bhat (back row third from right) during High-altitude Training with the Indian Airforce. 1985. Credit N.C. Bhat
Figure 14‑7 Space Recovery Experiment Capsule on display at VSSC. Credit ISRO
Figure 14‑8 Crew Module in the Andaman Sea after Splashdown. 18 December 2014. Credit ISRO
Figure 14‑9 Proposed Crew Vehicle (left), Crew Module Attached to the Service Module (centre) and the Emergency Capsule Abort System (right). Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑1 Steps Leading up to India’s First Moon Mission. Credit K. Kasturirangan
Figure 15‑2 Chandrayaan-1 and Its Science Payload. Credit Adapted from ISRO
Figure 15‑3 Chandrayaan-1 Orbit profile. Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑4 Moon Impact Probe. Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑5 Polar Region of the Lunar Surface Captured by Chandrayaan-1. 15 November 2008. Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑6 Chandrayaan-2 Rover. Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑7 Mars Orbiter Mission and Its Science Payload. Credit Adapted from ISRO
Figure 15‑8 Mars full disc captured by Mars Colour Camera from an altitude of 66543 km in October 2014. Credit ISRO
Figure 15‑9 Electromagnetic Spectrum. Credit NASA
Figure 15‑10 Astrosat and its Science Payload. Credit Adapted from ISRO
Figure 16‑1 Soviet, UK and USA Ambassadors signing the Outer Space Treaty observed by US President Johnson. Washington DC January 27, 1967. Credit UNOOSA
Figure 16‑2 Number of tests in India by missile type. Credit Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Figure 16‑3 Accumulation of space debris Jan 1960 – Jan 2017 in all orbits. Credit ESA
Figure 16‑4 Location of debris objects that have been recovered after re-entry. Credit ESA
Figure 16‑5 Multi-Object Tracking Radar. Credit ISRO
Figure 17‑1 Number of Projects in the RESPOND Programme between 1998 and 2011. Credit Adapted from Vikas Patel and Ankita Patel
Figure 17‑2 Global Satellite Industry Revenues ($ Billions). Credit Adapted from The Satellite Industry Association Report 2016
List of Tables
Table 7‑1 The 205 Rockets Launched from Thumba between 21 November 1963 and 31 March 1970. Credit Ashok Maharajah. * US supplied.
Table 8‑1 The Foreign Exchange Earned by Antrix. Credit Press Information Bureau of India 26 November 2014
Table 10‑1 Relative Differences between Propellant Types
Table 10‑2 Key Characteristics of ISRO's Launch Vehicles up to mid- 2017
Table 10‑3 Key Design Features of SLV-3
Table 10‑4 SLV-3 Launch History
Table 10‑5 A Comparison of SLV-3 and ASLV
Table 10‑6 ASLV Launch History
Table 10‑7 Typical PSLV-XL Specification
Table 10‑8 Overview of GSLV Configurations and Launch History
Table 10‑9 Typical GSLV Mk1 & Mk2 Specification.
Table 10‑10 Suborbital flight on 18/12/2014. LVM3-X/Care
Table 10‑11 GSLV-Mk3-D1/GSAT19 Specifications
Table 10‑12 Potential Future Launch Vehicles. Credit Norbert Brugge
Table 11‑1 Commercial Launchs undertaken in 2015. Credit FAA Annual Compendium 2016
Table 12‑1 ISRO’s First 10 Satellites
Table 12‑2 ISRO’s Earth Observation Satellites Operational in mid-2016
Table 12‑3 Overview of Ariane Passenger Pay Load Sequence of Events
Table 13‑1 IRNSS Orbits. Credit ISRO (*New Delhi is at longitude 77º E from where IRNSS-1C is nearly overhead)
Table 13‑2 Overview of the GAGAN Architecture
Table 13‑3‑ Summary of GNSS systems in operation and in development
Table 13‑4 Summary of National Satellite Navigation Systems
Table 15‑1 Chandrayaan-1Trajectory from the Earth to the Moon
Table 15‑2 Chandrayaan-1Payload Overview
Table 15‑3 Overview of Chandrayaan-2 Science Payload. Credit ISRO
Table 15‑4 Series of Earth orbits prior to departure for Mars
Table 15‑5 Overview of Mars Orbiter Mission’s Science Payload
Table 15‑6 Overview of Astrosat’s Science Payloads
Table 17‑1 Typical Classification of Satellites by Mass (* There is still some variation in definitions within the industry)
Introduction
Someone once said that if a book you want to read does not exist, it is your responsibility to write it. I was looking for a book that would help me understand how the Indian space programme had evolved, the key players, its technical capability, how space-based services are being used by Indian citizens and its role in shaping the nation's destiny as it ploughs headlong into the 21st century. Such a book did not exist. So, I set out to write it and after almost six years, this in your hands is it.
The central theme that runs through these pages is why in just 15 years after independence, India rolled up its sleeves and chose space technology to help transform a developing nation towards a developed nation. To what extent has it succeeded, and how has this capability shaped the perception of India in the 21st century? The start of India’s colonial period coincided with the European scientific Renaissance. The first ship from the UK arrived in India as Galileo looked at the night sky through the newly invented telescope. Was the vast maritime traffic and the inevitable people-to-people communication between Europe and India in the 16th and 17th centuries equivalent to the modern high-speed Internet link, bringing the products of the Industrial Age from the mighty cities of Europe to small villages in mostly rural India?
The story of the Indian space programme, as embodied by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO),
is long and complex. It cannot be comprehensively told in one telling. In this book, I attempt to explore the Indian space programme in three broad sections historical (chapters 1 to 6), existing capabilities (chapters 7 to 12) and current and new projects (chapters 13 to 17). The historical section looks at how the traditions of science and technology of ancient India have been preserved through India’s long and tumultuous history. India’s ancient traditions of science can be glimpsed in its modern institutions, and hints of modern scientific methods can be seen in its past. Mathematics and the application of scientific thinking were present in the civilisation that first arose around the Indus Valley perhaps 8000 years ago. Aryabhata, Bhaskara and others continued that scientific tradition albeit to satisfy an astrological demand which surprisingly continues to co-exist in India to this day.
At the outset of the colonial period, the British navy provided an information highway between India and the dynamic 16th-century European Renaissance. Scientists, scientific societies and institutions in India benefited to the extent that they served the British motive for profit. Nevertheless, a few gifted individuals did emerge in India, in some cases supported by the colonial power and have left their mark on modern science. Their names and scientific achievements, such as Bhabha Scattering, the Saha Equation, the Boson, Raman Effect, Bhatnagar-Mathur Magnetic Interference Balance and the Chandrasekhar Limit, are recorded in modern textbooks, although readers may not always be aware of their Indian origins.
Before 1799, Tipu Sultan had used rockets as weapons. The first rocket to enter space from India was launched 1963. In between, a now almost-forgotten actor tested rockets in India as a means of transport. In chapter 5, India’s Forgotten Rocketeer, I present perhaps the most detailed account of Stephen Smith’s contribution to rocketry in the early 20th century. Starting in the 1930s, in numerous experiments, he demonstrated the delivery of mail and small quantities of items useful in an emergency in the challenging mountainous landscape of Sikkim. He was also the first to test the use of rockets to transport living animals, a small hen and a cock. My thanks to Maureen Evers from the Families in British India Society for helping me track down Stephen Smith’s now London-based descendants.
The existing capability of the Indian space programme is a moving target. I have attempted to trace the evolution of India’s existing infrastructure of launch pads, launch vehicles and spacecraft and the technologies required to succeed in challenging and complex space missions. In painting that picture, I have also sought to capture the contributions of key individuals, such as Vikram Sarabhai, Homi Bhabha, Abdul Kalam, Satish Dhawan, U.R. Rao, and the international collaboration that they fostered to help kick-start ISRO’s infrastructure, particularly during the first four decades. India’s tradition of international collaboration continues today through active programmes with the UN and BRICS nations, as well as new ventures with Israel, Japan, NASA and European Space Agency. Since 2014, a new dynamic government with a nationalist and an aggressive economic agenda has been positioning itself to use the Indian space programme as an instrument for regional influence.
The current and new projects for which the Indian space programme has acquired global recognition emerged in the mid-1990s. By then, it had accomplished the goals set by its founders. India had developed an indigenous capability to build, launch and operate remote sensing, meteorological and communication satellites. Since the millennium, the Indian space programme has broken new ground offering services from space that include satellite navigation, search and rescue, air traffic control, military communication and science. With missions to the Moon and Mars and a telescope in Earth orbit, India is developing new skills and processes and instilling skills in its growing workforce for leading-edge space technologies. As its economy grows, India's population of 1.3 billion is beginning to take space-based services as a given, just as peoples of the developed nations.
The evolution of the Indian space programme from a standing start in 1963 to its current stunning capabilities is a beacon to developing and developed nations alike. But this journey has not been a smooth one. Missed opportunities, internal politics and international sanctions reined back the pace of development for many years. Today, with only a single launch site and still without a fully operational heavy-lift launch vehicle, the prospects for the Indian space programme are limited. The heavy-lift launch vehicle capability is essential to explore the surface of Mars, venture into the outer solar system, embark on human spaceflight and launch and operate a space station. The single launch site at Sriharikota further limits India’s space capability. ISRO achieved just eight launches in 2016, and it is not equipped to deliver all the services the nation demands.
Attracted by the engaging and captivating writings of historians, scientists and academics, my interest in history has grown with age. It emerged from reading books by writers, such as Michael Wood, Ramachandra Guha, Dr Rajinder Singh, Amrita Shah, William Dalrymple and especially Professor Rajesh Kochhar, who explores in detail the development of science and technology in India. This interest in the past took me to several archivists, including Sowmithri Ranganathan (IISc), Oindrila Raychaudhuri (TIFR), Paul Jenkins (India Study Circle), Lokesh Sharma (Sikkim State Archives) and Nalini Pradhan (Commissioner cum Secretary to the Government of Sikkim), who hosted my research visits.
Writing this book has been a long journey in time and space. It started in 2012 and took me to Sikkim in the north, Thumba in the south, Mumbai in the west and Sriharikota on the eastern coast of India. In addition to face-to-face meetings, I used the old-fashioned post, as well as modern media (Skype, email and Facebook) to source the information presented in these pages.
ISRO scientists, many who held senior posts at key times, provided me with current and accurate information, which is at the heart of this story. Several ISRO directors made time to talk to me, despite being engaged in demanding active missions at the time. They include M.Y.S. Prasad (Sriharikota), S.K. Shivakumar (ISAC), Dr Mylswamy Annadurai (ISAC), V.S. Hegde (Antrix), R. Raghunath (Byalalu), S. Ramakrishnan (VSSC) and especially Professor U.R. Rao, who found time for me during my multiple trips to the ISRO headquarters in Bangalore. Special thanks to two individuals without whom my visits to ISRO centres would not have been possible, the Director of Publications and Public Relations Mr. Deviprasad Karnik and the erudite scientist/engineer B.R. Guruprasad, who provided generous support and guidance from the start.
Acquiring first-hand testimony of the unique beginnings of the Indian space programme has been especially rewarding, as the number of individuals with such experiences is dwindling. Some of these individuals include Mrinalini Sarabhai, Dr Praful Bhavsar, Professor Roddam Narasimha and Professor Jacques Blamont. Several people helped me understand India's human spaceflight activities, most of which happened during the 1980s and not much progress has been made since. N.C. Bhat and P. Radhakrishnan shared their excitement at being selected to fly abroad the Space Shuttle and their disappointment when their mission, along with many others, was cancelled following the Space Shuttle Challenger accident in January 1986. In a very matter-of-fact way, Ravish Malhotra expressed his disappointment at not having experienced spaceflight despite completing a comprehensive training programme for it. My gratitude to Rakesh Sharma and his wife for hosting my visit to Coonoor, where we spoke at length about the adventure of his spaceflight. More than three decades on, he remains the sole individual with spaceflight experience supported by the Indian government.
I drew on the existing work by accomplished writers within and outside India on various aspects of the Indian space programme. These include R.P. Rajagopalan, P.V. Manoranjan Rao, Asif Siddiqi, Robert S. Anderson, Ajey Lele, George Joseph, R. Aravamudan, Gopal Raj (his book Reach for the Stars: The Evolution of India's Rocket Programme is probably one of the most underappreciated works in this field), GR Hathwar, D.A. Maharaj, Yash Pal, J.C. Moltz, Brian Harvey and Abdul Kalam.
I also want to acknowledge the contribution of several online sources
that provide surprisingly detailed information about spaceflight statistics and even mission analysis. They often provide references to publications and other reliable sources available publicly and offer this service without charge. Some of these sources of online independent information include Anatoly Zak, Gunter Krebs, Norbert Brügge, Jonathan McDowell, Narayan Prasad, Patrick Blau and V.K. Thakur. I also benefited from the immense body of work accumulated over time by organisations including the Union of Concerned Scientists, The Secure World Foundation, Nuclear Threat Initiative and national space agencies including NASA, ESA, CNSA and of course ISRO.
As with any writing project, it is the research and the rewriting that takes the most time and is the most productive. During the writing process, I sought reviews on initial drafts. Once complete I sought further feedback through a beta reading phase. The reviewers were mostly accomplished authors. One of the first reviewers was Brian Harvey, who provided constructive and encouraging feedback at a critical early stage. Others included Bert Viz, David Baker, Dr Jason Held, Andrew Thomas, Akash Yalagach, Bruce Gilham, Phil Clarke, Davide Sivolella, Gopal Raj and Shambo Bhattacharjee. The end product has been shaped by the input from several beta readers including Neil Jaworski, Mike Little, Manoranjan Rao, Tejaswi Shinde, Srinath Ravichandran, Bhargava Srinarasi and Ohsin.
If my writing looks ordered and polished, that has only been possible thanks to the astonishing contribution from my eagle-eyed editor Liza Joseph. I thank Bhushan Hadkar for his creative and technical skills for improving the quality of the images presented here.
During my research trips across India, I stayed in various places, but in Bangalore, I was fortunate to enjoy the warm hospitality and family atmosphere provided by my friend Satish, his wife Sumeetha and daughters Smurthi and Swathi (the S family).