12 years of Science in service of India
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Dr Jitendra Singh
Contd from previous issue
Group Captain Shu-bhanshu Shukla’s historic eighteen-day stay aboard the International Space Station brought India’s human spaceflight ambitions from aspiration to lived experience.
The transformation of India’s space sector goes beyond missions, significant as they are. The Indian Space Policy of 2023 opened the entire value chain—launch vehicles, satellites, ground systems — to private enterprise. The result has been electric. From just eleven space startups in 2014, India today hosts over four hundred, building rockets, designing satellites and creating applications that range from agricultural monitoring to disaster response. Indian launch vehicles have carried three hundred and ninety-nine foreign satellites into orbit since 2014, making us a preferred partner for space agencies around the world. The space economy is no longer a public-sector preserve; it is a national asset being built by thousands of young engineers and entrepreneurs. With the Bharatiya Antariksh Station — India’s own space station — envisioned for 2035, and a crewed lunar mission targeted for 2040, the arc of this ambition is long, and its trajectory is upward.
Self-Reliance Through Innovation
Atmanirbhar Bharat — self-reliant India — is not merely a political slogan. In science and technology, it has become a governing philosophy. The National Quantum Mission, backed by more than six thousand crore rupees, is an investment not just in a technology but in India’s strategic position in the twenty-first century’s most consequential technological race. Quantum computing promises to solve problems that classical computers cannot; quantum communication offers theoretically unbreakable encryption; quantum sensing could transform navigation, medical imaging and geological exploration. India is now building all of these capabilities at home, through Thematic Hubs that bring together universities, research institutions and industry.
The National Supercom-puting Mission has seeded high-performance computing infrastructure across the country—in Pune, Chennai, Kharagpur and beyond — giving Indian researchers, engineers and startups access to computational power that was once the preserve of a handful of elite institutions. Alongside this, BharatGen — the country’s first government-funded multilingual Generative AI programme — is developing large language models that can think and communicate in Indian languages, ensuring that the benefits of artificial intelligence are not confined to English-speaking users.
CSIR’s contribution to this vision of self-reliance deserves particular mention. The indigenously developed HANSA-NG trainer aircraft, produced for domestic and export markets, represents a capability built from scratch by Indian engineers. India’s first hydrogen fuel-cell powered vessel points toward clean maritime transport. Work on sustainable aviation fuel opens pathways to decarbonising air travel without dependence on foreign technology. The CSIR Innovation Complex, India’s first such facility, is designed to be a crucible where laboratory research meets entrepreneurial energy — a place where the distance between a scientific idea and a market-ready product is systematically compressed.
From just 11 space startups in 2014, India today hosts over 400 — a testament to the power of policy, public investment, and entrepreneurial spirit working in concert.
(To be contd)
Contd from previous issue
Group Captain Shu-bhanshu Shukla’s historic eighteen-day stay aboard the International Space Station brought India’s human spaceflight ambitions from aspiration to lived experience.
The transformation of India’s space sector goes beyond missions, significant as they are. The Indian Space Policy of 2023 opened the entire value chain—launch vehicles, satellites, ground systems — to private enterprise. The result has been electric. From just eleven space startups in 2014, India today hosts over four hundred, building rockets, designing satellites and creating applications that range from agricultural monitoring to disaster response. Indian launch vehicles have carried three hundred and ninety-nine foreign satellites into orbit since 2014, making us a preferred partner for space agencies around the world. The space economy is no longer a public-sector preserve; it is a national asset being built by thousands of young engineers and entrepreneurs. With the Bharatiya Antariksh Station — India’s own space station — envisioned for 2035, and a crewed lunar mission targeted for 2040, the arc of this ambition is long, and its trajectory is upward.
Self-Reliance Through Innovation
Atmanirbhar Bharat — self-reliant India — is not merely a political slogan. In science and technology, it has become a governing philosophy. The National Quantum Mission, backed by more than six thousand crore rupees, is an investment not just in a technology but in India’s strategic position in the twenty-first century’s most consequential technological race. Quantum computing promises to solve problems that classical computers cannot; quantum communication offers theoretically unbreakable encryption; quantum sensing could transform navigation, medical imaging and geological exploration. India is now building all of these capabilities at home, through Thematic Hubs that bring together universities, research institutions and industry.
The National Supercom-puting Mission has seeded high-performance computing infrastructure across the country—in Pune, Chennai, Kharagpur and beyond — giving Indian researchers, engineers and startups access to computational power that was once the preserve of a handful of elite institutions. Alongside this, BharatGen — the country’s first government-funded multilingual Generative AI programme — is developing large language models that can think and communicate in Indian languages, ensuring that the benefits of artificial intelligence are not confined to English-speaking users.
CSIR’s contribution to this vision of self-reliance deserves particular mention. The indigenously developed HANSA-NG trainer aircraft, produced for domestic and export markets, represents a capability built from scratch by Indian engineers. India’s first hydrogen fuel-cell powered vessel points toward clean maritime transport. Work on sustainable aviation fuel opens pathways to decarbonising air travel without dependence on foreign technology. The CSIR Innovation Complex, India’s first such facility, is designed to be a crucible where laboratory research meets entrepreneurial energy — a place where the distance between a scientific idea and a market-ready product is systematically compressed.
From just 11 space startups in 2014, India today hosts over 400 — a testament to the power of policy, public investment, and entrepreneurial spirit working in concert.
(To be contd)