The Indian Space Programme

by Gurbir Singh

  Howard Galloway, a NASA representative based in Ahmedabad for the duration of the SITE experiment, filed weekly reports on SITE’s progress.[423] For one of his reports (16–27 October 1975), he visited 29 villages, including Kapurwala, Hasanpura-Was, Nevta, Charenwala, Iuniywas, Bhavgarh, Bandhya, Dantli, Goner, Achrol and Dhand. He documented problems experienced by the villagers. This included unavailability of electricity or TV sets that did not work but found that in 89% of the visits, the system worked successfully. His reports included the first-hand testimony of those who had watched the programmes, as well as the SITE instructors, teachers and students. The novelty of the teaching approach using the television was particularly well received. He reported “There can be no two opinions about this. The TV is by far the most superior method that we have”. The farmers benefited from the agricultural programmes and started using the right kind and quantity of fertilisers and also adopted some improved agricultural practices. One villager, after viewing a programme on pesticides, said that if he had seen that last year, he could have saved his crop. An ISRO SITE assessment recorded similar success “Gain in knowledge and attitude per respondent was the highest in the field of agriculture followed by family planning, animal husbandry and health.”[424]

  In November 1975, Galloway’s report points to the enthusiasm with which the programmes were received by the villagers “Without exception, in all of the villages that we visited, the villagers sat quietly on the ground, on walls, on roofs, in trees, etc., with no talking and with an intense concentration on the screen. This behaviour was not exhibited for my benefit. I know this because until my photoflash went off, the folk were not aware of my presence.”[425] SITE introduced change to family and cultural traditions. Women came out of their homes to view the programmes. Cooking and family meal times were adjusted to accommodate the TV schedule. Watching SITE programmes also introduced a social change. Prior to SITE, most social interactions occurred when people went to the local market. TV provided a new source of entertainment and an opportunity to meet friends and family. Programmes on smallpox awareness increased demands for inoculations. Drunkenness and brawls that had been common also decreased. The use of a communal television set introduced an unintentional consequence: it “broke down the age-old caste distinctions.”[426] NASA’s representative in India also reported a perhaps more profound impact “that some parents did not want their children to become educated in schools because such an educated person was lost to farming. If a family had lots of children, they might waste one on schooling. Hopefully, this seems to be changing.”[427]

  E.V. Chitnis later took charge of the SITE programme and noted more significant benefits, which potentially had more long-lasting outcomes. In 1983, Chitnis assessed the value of the SITE programme and included the following as some of the more interesting observations:[428]

  The majority of SITE viewers were young men (15–24 years), middle-aged women (25–34 years) and children (below 15 years).

  In two sessions, 48,000 teachers were trained.

  SITE demonstrated that it is possible to teach and instruct illiterate men and women.

  SITE attracted non-media participants. Before SITE, 30% of the males and 63% females in villages had no contact with mass media. SITE reduced these percentages to 10% and 19% for males and females, respectively.

  Small farmers, marginal farmers, landless labourers, illiterates living in thatched mud houses were the majority of people in the SITE audience. The bicycle was their most prized possession.

  The evening SITE transmission consisted of 28% entertainment, 14% agriculture, 14% health and nutrition, 10% national awareness, 10% social problems and 15% news/information and 9% for the rest.

  One of the shortcomings that Galloway reported in September 1975 highlights the technological revolution that SITE had introduced. He notes that “most of the villagers have never seen TV or cinema before. They believe that an actor is a person that he portrays. Therefore, when they see two different stories on the same night, with the same actor in different roles, they become confused”. Overall, SITE was an outstanding success. A common plea from villagers, Galloway reported, was “please extend SITE by 1 or 2 or more years”. Probably, the only group who were not supportive were the school teachers because they felt threatened by the overwhelming success of SITE. The experiment was not extended. In January 1976, with SITE in full swing, India hosted a 2-week winter school sponsored by the UN in association with UNESCO to share the concepts and technology behind SITE. Seventeen participants from developing countries attended. They included Bolivia, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kenya, Kuwait, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Sudan, Thailand, Turkey and Tunisia.

  The Sri Lanka-based Arthur C. Clarke also attended the winter school. Of the 2,400 direct receiving stations, one was made available by ISRO at Clarke’s residence.[429] In the 21st century, millions around the globe enjoy the luxury of a satellite-connected television in their living rooms. In 1975, Clarke’s house in Sri Lanka was the only private residence with direct satellite reception. Despite being at the southern end of the ATS-6 footprint, he reported good reception.[430] Despite a large national commitment in effort and resources, the US made ATS-6 available to India for a year. What was in it for the US? Arnold Frutkin (born 1918), Assistant Administrator for International Affairs for NASA, noted in 2002 that SITE was “not only an educational lift to India and demonstrated what such a satellite could do, but it brought money back into the US, through commercial contracts for satellites for a number of years.”99 This was a reference to the satellites of the Indian National Satellite System (INSAT) that India purchased from Ford Aerospace and Communications Corporation in the wake of SITE in the 1980s. Apart from the technical and economic benefits, political advantage was probably the most significant. At a time when the USSR’s activities were blanketed in secrecy, SITE reinforced the US’s transparency. It also initiated a new market in aerospace products which continue to improve the balance of US trade.100 Using space technology to get a foot in the door, the US could then achieve its broader, global political objective of promoting democracy.

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  Chapter Eight

  Inside the Indian Space Research Organisation

  I n just over 5 decades, India has developed from the ground-up the capability to deliver to its 1.3 billion citizens the modern first-world services that can only be supplied from space. With a beginning epitomised by images of a rocket cone on a bicycle and a satellite on a bullock cart, today India is one of 11 nations that have developed an operational space industry[431], delivering a variety of services to enhance the quality of life for most of its citizens. The growing quality and scale of services include satellite-based search and rescue, tsunami warnings, navigation, television content, communication, scientific exploration and meteorological and remote-sensing services. By the end of the 20th century, ISRO had developed the domestic capacity to build satellites and launch them to orbit and had established the sophisticated ground infrastructure necessary to operate them. The national space programme first imagined by its founders was in place.

  The space programme in India had its origins in the 1962 INCOSPAR, inspired by the 1958 COSPAR established by the International Council for Science. INCOSPAR became ISRO and formally came into its current form in 1972 under a reorganisation driven by its second chairman, Satish Dhawan, who took over after Vikram Sarabhai’s sudden death.[432] Not only was ISRO’s headquarters moved from Ahmedabad to Bangalore (now Bengaluru), but the delinking of India’s space and nuclear programmes proposed before Vikram’s death was also implemented. ISRO was moved from the DAE the new Department of Space.[433]

  Under this new arrangement, ISRO’s chairman was also required to hold the roles of the secretary to DOS and the chairman of the Space Commission, thereby reporting to the highest political office. The DOS through the Space Commission defined the space policy that ISRO implemented.

  Organisationally, this structure gave
the ISRO chairman direct access to the Prime Minister, which “was crucial in bringing policy-making and executive functions under one head,” reducing the frustrating and time-consuming procedures for which the Indian Civil Service is infamous.[434] The constitution used by the DOS for ISRO was modelled on the concise one-page constitution designed by Homi Bhabha for the AEC.[435] Dhawan oversaw the building of India’s first satellite Aryabhata in 1975 and the Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-3) in 1980 and firmly implanted Sarabhai’s original vision of national development through space technology into the very fabric of ISRO. He also ensured ISRO was in harmony with Jawaharlal Nehru’s desire to “develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform”.

  Figure 8‑1 ISRO Centres Providing Scientific, Technical and Administrative Support across India. Credit ISRO

  While the DOS primarily serves an administrative role, and is charged with managing the finances, the Space Commission made up of a dozen representatives from other departments of the government, such as finance and defence, and two individuals (scientists, engineers, or academics) from outside the government provide an element of independent oversight. The Space Commission's role is to scrutinise ISRO's proposals for feasibility and compliance with its objectives and government policy. It is a “very powerful body, which has immeasurably helped in evolving and executing a healthy space programme in India with total flexibility, power and full accountability.”[436] For example, ISRO’s mission to the Moon in 2008, Chandrayaan-1 triggered a lively and lengthy debate because its science objectives were difficult to reconcile with ISRO’s vision to harness space technology for national development.[437]

  Since its establishment as INCOSPAR in 1962 under India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, ISRO has evolved in its scale and scope. Today, ISRO employs a 16,000-strong workforce spread across 42 separate centres located across India's 29 states and seven union territories. It has an annual budget of $1.2 billon (Rs. 8,020 crore) and the vision “to harness space technology for national development while pursuing space science research and planetary exploration”. ISRO uses this infrastructure to design, build and operate satellites for scientific research, remote sensing, communication, navigation, meteorology, search and rescue and social applications.

  Figure 8‑2 ISRO Headquarters in Bengaluru. Credit Author

  Interestingly, ISRO with a budget of $1.2 billion (Rs. 8,020 crore) and NASA with a budget of $19.5 billion (Rs. 130,000 crore) have about the same number of staff, 16,000 and 18,000, respectively. NASA outsources most of its work to third parties, such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Orbital ATK and SpaceX whereas ISRO has struggled to outsource,[438] in part because India does not yet have a sufficiently mature private sector capable of meeting the highly specialised needs for space-qualified components and systems.[439]

  Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre

  VSSC, located in Thumba 14 km north-west of Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala, is ISRO's cradle. During the 1960s, the site around Thumba grew as INCOSPAR embarked on its long journey to fulfil Sarabhai's vision of an India with an indigenous space programme capable of pushing national development. The number of buildings increased to support additional functions, such as a facility for launch vehicle manufacturing, workshops for developing propellant and laboratories for vehicle testing and integration. VSSC was established in its current form after Sarabhai's death in 1971 by amalgamating the various workshops, activities, teams and laboratories that had accumulated over the first decade of India's space programme. Employing over 5,000 people, VSSC is ISRO's largest centre.[440]

  Figure 8‑3 Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre. Credit ISRO

  After it was founded in 1962, TERLS, which grew into VSSC, was used primarily for launching sounding rockets, a tradition that persists, albeit with reduced intensity. It was established with the aid of the UN and, in February 1968, was formally dedicated as a UN site with a focus on international collaboration. Today, VSSC sprawls over an extended area and encompasses the original Thumba launch site and the church of St. Mary Magdalene used as headquarters in 1962. The church has now been converted into a museum housing many of ISRO’s space artefacts. The central office today is located in a modern building, high on a hill overlooking the Arabian Sea. While the Satish Dhawan Space Centre or Sriharikota (also known as SHAR or SDSC-SHAR but most commonly known as Sriharikota) is the centre of attention on a launch day, most of the production and preparation in the weeks leading up to a launch take place at VSSC, 800 km southwest from Sriharikota.

  Given that both VSSC and Sriharikota are on India's coastline, transport by sea would appear to be a natural option, but India's strict environment laws forbid it. The rocket stages and the inter-stage sections are designed, built, tested and manufactured at VSSC and transported to Sriharikota by road. Likewise, liquid, semi-cryogenic and cryogenic propellants are produced at the ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC), Mahendragiri, transported by road and stored at the Filling Control Centre at Sriharikota. The solid propellant is manufactured locally at Sriharikota. The spacecraft from Bangalore, too, arrives at Sriharikota by road. Once all the elements arrive at Sriharikota, the vehicle integration in the Vehicle Assembly Building or on-site at the First Launch Pad. Much of ISRO's research and development on launch vehicle systems is conducted at VSSC, including overall launch vehicle design, structures, aerodynamics & flight mechanics, polymers and composite materials, avionics, guidance systems, thermal coatings and all testing/qualification and system integration for each flight. A Hypersonic Wind Tunnel facility was opened in 2017 at VSSC to support supersonic flight.[441]

  VSSC also houses a Supercomputer for Aerospace with GPU Architecture (SAGA). It was originally set up in 2011 and is regularly upgraded to support the R&D computational requirements. Each launch vehicle programme has its project teams which bring together all the systems to realise the launch vehicle. Initial work on future ISRO programmes for human spaceflight, reusable launch vehicle-technology demonstrator (RLV-TD) and air-breathing engines are also conducted at VSSC. VSSC fabricated the aircraft-like structure for the RLV, completely in-house. The technology of Lithium-Ion batteries used to power spacecraft in orbit was developed in VSSC and is now being outsourced for mass production for commercial use by Indian industry. Up-scaled version of these batteries is being used to power electric buses for public technology – a spin-off technology. Space Physics Laboratory, initially conceived by Sarabhai, is now an autonomous laboratory and a part of VSSC. SPL was instrumental in developing scientific payloads for Chandrayaan, Astrosat and Mangalyaan missions.

  Space Applications Centre

  While attending the 1968 Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) in Vienna, Sarabhai had concluded “one of the most striking things to emerge has been appreciation of the great potentiality of remote-sensing devices, capable of offering large-scale practical benefits.”[442] By 1972, Sriharikota had been set up, Sarabhai's plans for the SLV-3 launch vehicle was in progress, and U.R. Rao had started building India's first satellite, Aryabhata. The prospect of Indian-built satellites launched from Indian soil by Indian launchers was becoming imminent.

  Figure 8‑4 Experimental Satellite Communication Earth Station Built in 1966. Credit ISRO

  In September 1972, ISRO's chairman Satish Dhawan created the Space Applications Centre (SAC) by consolidating the various ISRO specialist units in Ahmedabad into a single centre. Professor Yash Pal, a senior professor, specialising in cosmic rays at the TIFR, was appointed SAC's first director. SAC was tasked to build remote-sensing sensors, subsystems and applications for Indian satellites. A year after Sarabhai's death, the elements necessary to realise his vision of an indigenous space programme were beginning to come together.

  Just as Professor Pal was starting his role at SAC, the US launched the Earth Resources Technology Satellite (ERTS) designed to look at the US’s natural resources, including forests, rivers, minerals and geology and help monitor floods and environmental pollution. Among its many ac
hievements, ERTS (later Landsat 1) discovered an island of almost 3,000 km2, located off the east coast of Canada.[443] By 1972, India had been independent for just over two decades and did not have a clear picture of its natural resources. ERTS demonstrated the potential of space-borne systems. Space technology was the most cost-efficient mechanism to help identify and quantify the natural resources across the huge Indian landmass. SAC’s primary purpose was the development of space-borne and airborne instruments and associated applications that can be exploited for national development and societal benefits.

  Figure 8‑5 George Joseph Explaining to Prof. Dhawan (extreme left) and Prof. Yash Pal the Operation of the Multispectral Scanner Inside a Dakota Aircraft. 1976. Credit Dr. George Joseph

  Pal recognised the importance of engaging all stakeholders from the outset to ensure that the applications met the needs of all its users. The multidisciplinary approach that Sarabhai had built into ISRO at the outset, Pal implanted within SAC. He engaged specialists from different fields; they included scientists, engineers, application developers and social scientists. Just as Sarabhai had no experienced rocket scientists in India when he embarked on a programme to build rockets, Pal did not have a pool of experienced specialists for building space grade sensors, remote-sensing systems and applications. He turned to TIFR and invited three scientists, Dr George Joseph (born 1938), a cosmic ray physicist; Dr Baldev Sahai, a nuclear physicist; and Mr D. S. Kamath, a computer specialist. None of them had experience with remote sensing. Again, like VSSC in 1963, SAC made use of makeshift facilities. In the absence of optics laboratories, initially, the remote-sensing team at SAC converted a kitchen within their residential apartment into a dark room and set up an optical bench.[444]