Ever since we had come across it, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) has been our all time favourites.

Although, some traces of scandals on unrelated issues such as seniority matters between the scientists engaged in research programmes were evident in the premises of this well established organization , no conflicts related to the learned occupation and its essential applications were never portrayed anywhere in the vicinity, except for a few including the last couples from its previous director himself. Yet, the amount of professionalism displayed, even in the case of launching the dummy satellites, can in no way be discredited by a man secret intelligence, definitely, he will treat it only as some random measures taken to improve the vigilance and surveillance essential for such organizations.

And with the successful completion of the Trans-Mars Injection procedure involved in the high profile Mars Obiter Mission, ISRO has now said to have achieved a greater degree of excellence along with its counterparts engaged in similar missions.

We read it:
ISRO Chairman K. Radhakrishnan told The Hindu from ISTRAC, “Everything went of well. We took stock of the spacecraft’s health and everything is normal. We just had a meeting with all the ground controllers and mission directors who briefed us on the spacecraft’s systems and all are working well.”
India’s spacecraft to Mars has bid adieu to its Earth-bound orbit and is cruising in its sun-centric orbit. In a remarkably successful execution of a complex manoeuvre, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) fired the propulsion system on board the spacecraft for a prolonged duration of 23 minutes from 0049 hours on Sunday.


In this context, The Hindu met K. Radhakrishnan, ISRO Chairman, on November 18 in his office at ISRO headquarters, Bangalore, for his assessment of what has been achieved so far in India’s Mars Orbiter Mission, what lies ahead, the complexity of the mission, the spacecraft’s autonomy to take decisions on its own when there is an emergency etc.. Excerpts from the interview with Dr. Radhakrishnan, who is also Chairman, Space Commission and Secretary, Department of Space:

How do you assess what has been achieved so far in ISRO’s Mars Orbiter Mission?

After the launch of the PSLV-C25 on November 5, the separation of the Mars Orbiter from the launch vehicle was smooth and the injection of the spacecraft into the earth-bound orbit was precise. During the last few days, we have been raising the spacecraft’s orbit, specifically its apogee in steps. The first orbit-raising manoeuvre was done in the early hours of November 7. Till now, we have completed six manoeuvres including a supplementary one. Currently, the spacecraft’s apogee is 1,92,915 km.

In the early hours of December 1, around 00.36 hours, we have the trans-Mars injection of our Mars spacecraft. On that day, we are going to use the 440 Newton liquid engine again to impart a delta-v, that is, an incremental velocity of nearly 648 metres a second to the spacecraft and the engine will burn for 1,351 seconds. It is crucial in the sense that we need to give the exact velocity required to take the spacecraft from the earth-orbit, passing through the sphere of influence of the earth which extends up to 9.25 lakh km from the earth, cruise through the long helio-centric phase, then get into the sphere of influence of Mars, and on its arrival near Mars on September 24, 2014, it has to be put into 376 km plus or minus 50 km above Mars at that point of time.

We need to be patient.

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