On Thursday, Science & Technology Minister, Dr Jitendra Singh, revealed about Gaganyaan. He said that India is going to launch its first manned space mission “Gaganyaan” in 2023. In Rajya Sabha assembly, the minister answered upon asking about the same. He stated that our nation’s first human space mission will reach the outer space in 2023. This will be a huge accomplishment, as India will join US, Russia and China in the list of launching human spaceflight. India would be the fourth nation to do so.

Before this, two crewed space flights will be launched, first is scheduled during the mid of 2022. And other one has been scheduled for the end of 2022. Both of these space flights would be launched as test vehicle flight for the validation of Crew Escape System performance.

“This will be followed by the second uncrewed mission at the end of 2022 carrying “Vyommitra” a spacefaring human-robot developed by ISRO and finally the first crewed Gaganyaan mission in 2023,”, Dr Jitendra said.

In 2018, Prime Minister Modi stated that by 2022, India will have sent its first manned space flight. But the Covid-19 pandemic hampered the plans. However, Dr Singh assured in the Rajya Sabha, that preparations of the launch are in full swing, and by 2023 India will definitely achieve this feat.

Preparations at ISRO

In Bengaluru, ISRO has also established an astronaut training facility that is nearing complete. Russian Space Agency Roscosmos and CNES (French Space Agency) will be soon delivering Space suits, crew seat and view ports.

“The configuration and design of ground infrastructure has been completed and modifications needed are being implemented. The MoU, contracts and Implementation arrangement (IA) related activities with both national and international agencies are progressing well,” Dr Singh said.

He also added, “Receipt of deliverables has commenced against contracts with M/s Glavkosmos (Russian Space Agency) for space suit, crew seat and View port. Also receipt of deliverables under various work packages of CNES (French Space Agency) IA has commenced.”

Project “Gaganyaan” has been setup to demonstrate the capability of ISRO to send humans in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and bring them back safely.