An Overview of the Indian Space Program as of Feb 2009

1. Beyond The Final Frontier III -
The Indian Dream
Feb 2009 – Capfalcon.com – Nadir Belarbi
Since several years, as wealth travels West to
East in search of investments, so does the
space race, now concentrated in Asia, between
China and India. An amazing change when
only a few years ago, Japan was the Asian
leader in space programs.
The Indian space program is the symbol of the country excellence and the fastest way to
establish its new super power status and emancipating from the ghosts of the British
colonizer. As China, India is also dreaming of moonwalks and space conquest, latest trend for
all those countries who wants to end up with the world order established after the end of the
Second World War.
The country is not a new comer in the club of space launchers. The country launched its first
satellite into orbit the 18th of July 1980, ten years after the Chinese and the fourth country in
the world.
With an equivalent budget of $1.3B in 2008 but only
16,000 employees, the Indian Space Research
Organization (ISRO) is smaller than the Chinese CNSA
yet very ambitious.
The ISRO has launched 25 missions and the number is
planned to grow up to 70 in the next five years.
The Indian Military didn't like the Chinese shoot down of
a weather satellite in January 2007 and they renewed their
claims for an Indian Military Space program, probably
another factor that catalyzes the space program funding
and the Asian space race.
India has reached an important milestone in the mastering
of the space and satellite technology by impressing the
space international community the last 28th of April 2008
when 10 satellites were launched aboard a unique
launcher. The thirteenth flight of the ISRO’s Polar
Satellite Launch Vehicle, PSLV-C9, successfully
PSLV-C11 Launcher Lift Off, 295 launched the 690 kg Indian remote sensing satellite
Tonnes, Payload to LEO, 3.25 CARTOSAT-2A, the 83 kg Indian Mini Satellite (IMS-1)
Tonnes and eight nano-satellites for international customers into a
637 km polar Sun Synchronous Orbit (SSO).
Six months later, the nation successfully launched the 28th of October 2008, the
Chandrayaan-I probe around the moon from the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching
Station (TERLS). During the next two years, the orbiter will to survey the lunar surface to
produce a complete map of its chemical characteristics and 3-dimensional topography.
Another probe is scheduled in 2012 forsoil and mineral exploration on the lunar surface with
the help of a robotic device.

2. Between surveillance and commercial uses, Satellite Mapping is an increasing trend in the
world space community and India is on board the moving train.
ISRO is thus expected to launch by March 2009, its own Google Map service called Bhuvan
offering satellite pictures with a resolution of 10 m (32.8 ft). Current Google maps resolution
is around 200 m (656 ft).
In the mean time though, a recent observation
satellite GeoEye-1 launched by Boeing with
the collaboration of several stakeholders
including Google is expected to increase the
Google Maps resolution up to 50 cm (19.5
in). The satellite is able to take pictures with
a resolution of 41 cm (16 in) but all pictures
with a resolution below 50 cm (19.5 in) can
only be used by the government. Interestingly
GeoEye-2, scheduled for launch in 2011 or
2012 will have a 25 cm (10 in) resolution but
still only available to the government.
India is also willing to get its own GPS
system by 2012, called the Indian Regional
Navigational Satellite System (IRNSS), an Moon's surface taken from lunar orbit by
autonomous regional satellite navigation Chandrayaan-1
system. As for Russia, Europe and China, the The bright terrain on the lower left is the rim of
requirement of such a navigation system is 117 km wide Moretus crater. Taken over the polar
driven by the fact that access to the Global region of the moon, November 15, 2008.
Navigation Satellite Systems, GPS, owned by
the United States is not guaranteed in hostile
situations.
As the Chinese CNSA, the Indian ISRO is also collaborating with other space agencies,
NASA on the Moon probe mission and the Russian RFSA on manned flights. The Indian
Space Research Organization (ISRO) is planning to launch the first manned flight in 2015 and
is already claiming that an Indian astronaut will walk on the moon by 2025.
The last 3rd of January 2009, ISRO revealed some details of its manned program and the
orbiting crew capsule, weighing 3 tons and planned to host 2 astronauts at an orbit of 400 Km
(248 miles) around the Earth. The capsule will be designed to carry three people; a future
version will be equipped with a rendezvous and docking capability.
Hard to not be stroke by the low budget dedicated to the Indian manned program. Only $2B
over 10 years. The three quarters of this amount is used by NASA for each launch of the
Space Shuttle and the recent delays of the Discovery STS-119 mission just confirm the
analysis of my first post on the Shuttle program: The maintenance of the shuttle is so costly
that it overrides overwhelmingly its return on investment as a reusable spacecraft.
The Indian government did yet approve the budget of the manned program but the design
already started in 2006, with "just" $20M. Will India be the third nation to walk on the moon
in 2025, a year after the Chinese? All will depend on the mission readiness and the
economical context. The current global recession will definitely have an impact on both space
programs.

3. PSLV5 Typical Flight Profile
In the meantime, dates announcements of Lunar Missions are firing up every month,
reflecting the eagerness of each nation to be the first on the Moon after the United States.
Retrospectively, the schedule of the man return to the Moon in 2018 for the US, 2024 for
China and 2025 for India is interesting.
The 2018 - 2024 period will be definitely a remake of the sixties and the excitement of the
race to the Moon of the Apollo program.
With a cost of "only" $83 M, Chandrayaan-1, the Indian lunar probe, is considered the most
inexpensive lunar probe ever launched. Its cost is nearly one-third of China's Chang'e-1 and
one-sixth of Japan's Kaguya. "With a minuscule budget, we have mastered cutting-edge
technology in space," says Indian Space Research Organisation chairman G Madhavan Nair.
Asia reinvented the economics of space programs and India is optimizing them, reminding us
that tremendous investments are not a mandatory prerequisite to be in orbit around the Earth.
It's a lesson to learn for all those who design launchers but forget to question their efficiency.
Despite many projects, the state of art of space launchers hasn't yet come up with a viable
alternative to disposable rockets.
Thousand of miles to the West, while China and India race for new challenges and stunning
announcements, Europe seems quiet.

4. Nadir Belarbi received an Engineering degree from the University of Science and Technology of
Oran, Algeria (1993), a Master Degree in Networks and Telecommunications from Paris V University
& Sup Telecom Paris, France (1994), studied 3 years of studies and research on Intelligent Networks
during a PhD program (1997) and received an Executive MBA from the Chicago University, Booth
Graduate School of Business, USA (2008). He has worked for IBM, Air France, Groupe Danone and
Dannon US. He is currently (2012) an IT Program Director at The Canadian National (CN).
Nadir Belarbi’s research has spanned a large number of disciplines, emphasizing information
technology and telecommunications with a focus on emerging technologies. As a manager with multi-
cultural skills speaking five languages, he worked in an international environment where he specialized
in the coordination and lobbying of global organizations.
His political and social experience ranges from heading the corporate work council to participating in
political and geopolitical organizations and think tanks. With a major interest in Intelligence,
Technology & Energy roles in Geopolitical, Military & Security issues, he is now managing a
LinkedIn group and a Portal (capfalcon.com) on Business, Innovation & Geopolitics.