New Delhi: The Government today informed the Rajya Sabha that India has signed space cooperative documents with 61 countries and five multilateral bodies and the major areas of cooperation are satellite remote sensing, satellite navigation, satellite communication, space science and planetary exploration and capacity building.
In a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha about the space cooperative documents, Union Minister of State for Space, Dr Jitendra Singh said the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) was already working with the space agency of USA (NASA) to realising a joint satellite mission, named ‘NISAR (NASA ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar)’ which is in the advanced stages of realisation.
He further said ISRO was also working with the French National Space Agency, CNES, to realise a joint satellite mission named ‘TRISHNA (Thermal Infrared Imaging Satellite for High-Resolution Natural Resource Assessment)’, which is in the initial stages.
ISRO and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) too carried out a feasibility study to realise a joint lunar polar exploration mission.
The Minister said the Indian Space Policy – 2023 has been released, which provides the freedom of innovation to the private sector to pursue end-to-end activities in the space domain.
Further, he told the Upper House, that the India National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe) has been functioning as a single-window agency to promote, authorise and encourage private sector participation in the space sector.
“ISRO pursues international collaboration with the objectives of enhancing the capacity of the Indian space programme for advancing programmatic priorities, augmenting space science and earth observation database, widening ground station networks, bettering products and services through joint experiments and creating platforms for inflow of expertise,” Dr Singh said.
– global bihari bureau
