Under 'Gaganyaan' mission, first Indian astronaut to be sent to space by Dec 2021: ISRO chief Sivan

ISRO chief K Sivan on Saturday said that the first Indian astronaut will be sent to space under the 'Gaganyaan' mission for which the work is already underway.

He said the mission is "extremely important" for India as it will give a thrust to the country's science and technology capabilities.

"There are some questions. In what way Gaganyaan is going to be useful? Gaganyaan is extremely important for India as it will boost the science and technology capability of the country," he said.

"By December 2020, we are going to have the first unmanned mission of human spacecraft," added Sivan, while addressing the 8th convocation of IIT Bhubaneswar.

"The second unmanned human spacecraft, we are targeting for July 2021. By December 2021, the first Indian will be carried out by our own rocket to space. This is our target. Everybody at the ISRO is working for that," he said.

Sivan underlined that the vision of ISRO's founding chairman Vikram Sarabhai is being realised as the space agency is embarking on expanding the scope of India's space programme.

"Starting a space programme in a country like India in the 1960s was a big crazy idea. But Dr Sarabhai foresaw the potential of space technology in transforming India and the whole world was using space for military domination," he said.

"Dr Sarabhai thought that for a country like India with immense size and diversity, space technology is the only suitable platform for fast-track development. Today, the results are here for all of us to see," the ISRO chairman stressed.

Sivan told the IITians gathered that they need to conquer personal fears, taking calculated risks and requiring innovation and lateral thinking. He stressed that innovation comes with a high level of risks and failures.

"How many times (Thomas) Edison failed in inventing the light bulb? How many times did ISRO face failures in the development of our launch vehicles? These failures did not become obstacles in our path. We used the failures as learning opportunities," he said.

Sivan said that while India may be perceived as a poor country by many people, it stands first in the world for sending remote sensing satellites.

( With inputs from ANI )