Chandrayaan-1, India's Lunar Space Craft to Map the Moon

The Chandrayaan-1 mission is India's first lunar spacecraft, announced by Prime Minister Mr. Atal Bihari Vajpayeeon on Indian Independence Day, August 15, 2003. The launch date of the moon probe was October 22nd, 2008. It is presently enroute to the Moon, which will take 16 days.

The mission will last 2 years, to map the moon's surface in high resolution as well as map the mineralogical composition and get more details on the ice at the Moon's poles.

Instruments on-board come from the USA, European Union, Bulgaria and India itself.

India has emerged as an "offshore" space services provider, showing that its talented race and culture can compete in this high value export market.

This is no surprise, as scientific and professional journals have long been packed with significant contributions by Indians. This has been quite disproportionate relative to the population, i.e., cannot be attributed simply to the numbers of Indians in the world. A higher percentage of Indians create significant new understanding, knowledge and technology. When computer technology companies want a competitive edge in productivity, they could go anywhere, but they most often choose India, even though there is IT overcapacity in other countries which offer greater incentives. India's competitive strength is creativity, quality and productivity per person.

In 1980, India became the eighth country to launch a satellite into orbit, after the USSR (1957), US (1958), France (1965), Japan (1970), China (1970), UK (1971), and the European Space Agency (1979), and before Israel (1988) and Iraq (1989).

India has continuously developed advanced space technology capabilities.

India will be launching its probe all the way to lunar orbit using its own rocket technology.

India has earned the right to be proud of its space achievements.

If a company wants greater productivity for their money, then they should consider India as a research and technology center for development. Russia, of course, is a leader in space services, and China may play a dramatically greater role if its manned space program proves reliable and if internal political reforms open up the country to friendlier relations.

Chandrayaar-1 means that India is staying at the forefront of humankind's exploration and development of space, which will be done fastest, cheapest and most sustainably by the private sector -- "commercial space development", as explained in the website mentioned below.

Note: This is not the official website of the Chandrayaan-1 program and is not associated with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) or any government space agency. The official website is currently at www.isro.org/chandrayaan-1/ . There may be things on this website which ISRO would not put on their official government website. This website is in advocacy of Chandrayaan-1 and India's space program, and intended to be a complimentary website.