Fifty years in the making, India's Space Programmme is fulfilling the vision of its founders and delivering services from space that touch the lives of the 1.3 billion people of every day. In addition to operating a collection of satellites for weather, Earth observation, navigation and communication, today has a spacecraft orbiting Mars and a space telescope orbiting the Earth. This book provides the big picture of India's long association with science, from historical figures like Aryabhata and Bhaskara to Homi Bhabha and Vikram Sarabhai, the key architects of its space program. It covers the scientific contribution of Indian scientist during the European enlightenment and industrial revolution through the work of physicist S.N Bose, experimentalist J.C. Bose, mathematician S. Ramanujan and Nobel Laureate C.V. Raman and others. It traces the technological development of Tipu Sultan's use of rockets for war in the 1780s; the all but forgotten contribution of Stephen H Smith's use of rockets as a means of transport in 1935 in northern India and the emergence of Sriharikota – India's spaceport.
Key questions about the Indian Space Research Organisation covered in the book, include; a detailed account of why a fishing village in Kerala was used to launch India's first rocket into space on 21 November 1963, what types of launchers India has developed? How are the ordinary people of India benefit from the space programme? How did India get to the Moon and Mars? What are the prospects for India's ambitions in space for human spaceflight, military and science? In space will India compete or collaborate with China, USA and Russia?
This detailed work in 645 pages, 29 tables and 9 appendices is richly illustrated with 140+ illustrations (some images published for the first time) and supported by over 1000 references. It is written for the non-specialist offering a big picture view of India's space program – its history, current status and future ambitions, all in one place.
posted 10-10-2017 09:09 AM
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