1. Presentation on MOM
Mars Orbiter Mission – An Achievement By India
By Faisal Ahmed Khan,
1st Sem-MBA,
HKBK-CE.
2. Introduction:
The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), also
called Mangalyaan "Mars-craft“ is a
spacecraft orbiting Mars since 24th September 2014. It was
launched on 5th November (Tuesday) 2013 by the Indian Space
Research Organization(ISRO). It is India's first interplanetary
mission and ISRO has become the fourth space agency to
reach Mars, after the Soviet space program, NASA, and
the European Space Agency. It is also the first nation to
reach Mars orbit on its first attempt, and the first Asian nation
to do so.
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3. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on congratulated India and ISRO
scientists for creating history by successfully inserting the Mars
Orbiter Mission into the Red Planet's orbit.
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4. Cost of the project:
The total cost of the mission was approximately $70
million/427,00,00,000 (427cr), roughly one-tenth the cost of
Maven(a project by NASA) and is the cheapest inter-planetary
mission ever to be undertaken since Martian exploration
began. The low cost of the mission was described by Kopillil
Radhakrishnan, the chairman of ISRO, to various factors,
including a "modular approach", a small number of ground
tests and long (18-20 hour) working days for scientists. Author
and commentator Chetan Bhagat tweeted that the cost of the
mission was in fact cheaper than the opening ceremony of the
Commonwealth Games hosted by New Delhi in 2010.
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5. BBC's Jonathan Amos mentioned that MOM used lower worker
costs, technologies, simpler design, and significantly less
complicated payload than NASA's MAVEN. An opinion piece
in The Hindu newspaper pointed out that the cost was
equivalent to less than a single bus ride for each of India's
population of 1.2 billion. In simpler words approximately Rs. 4
per person.
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7. Objectives:
The primary objective of the Mars Orbiter Mission is to showcase
India's rocket launch systems, spacecraft-building and
operations capabilities. Specifically, the primary objective is to
develop the technologies required for design, planning,
management and operations of an interplanetary missions.
The secondary objective is to attract global investments as
India's Mars mission is boon for its space business.
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8. Other Advantages:
The country's business sector applauded the mission, with the
Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry
saying "it will encourage Indian industry to invest in the
research and innovation.“
India also could soon join in collaborative missions with
NASA(National Aeronautics and Space Administration-USA) or
any other space agency.
The program has described its goals as to “support the
developmental activities of the nation, and bring benefit to its
society and its citizens,” through, among other methods, a
satellite system that “provides operational service and
supports inventory of land use/cover, vegetation/forests,
water resources, urban areas, soils, coastal areas, etc.;
monitoring the environment, and support to Disaster
Management.”
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9. These satellites help people on the ground—like farmers,
fisherman, and other agricultural professionals—by giving
weather predictions. Their weather predictions have also
helped in times of natural disaster, as they are used to
evacuate civilians from dangerous areas preemptively.
Limitation of Project MOM:
MOM has less practical applications than any of ISRO’s
previous ventures, and has therefore generated more
opposition from the people who believe India should not be
spending money on space exploration.
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10. Top 10 Countries ranked with Space Presence and Achievements:
1. United States of America
2. Russia
3. China
4. France
5. India
6. United Kingdom
7. Japan
8. South Korea
9. Iran
10. Israel
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11. AAM AADMI Opinions on MOM:
Despite the relatively low cost of the Mars Orbiter Mission, the
project has received some criticism from factions in India that
believe the mission is a waste of government funds.
This is a nation, where one-third of the population - 400 million
people - live below the poverty line. This is a nation where
more than 40 percent of children are malnourished and 1,655
children under 5 years old die every day from preventable
diseases such malaria, diarrhea and pneumonia. To add to this
is a nation where about 620 million people are forced to
defecate in the open and many do not have access to clean
drinking water.
“Should we really be exploring Mars when we don't even have
toilets for our people”, a journalist asked.
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12. "I believe that in a country where 230 million people sleep
hungry every night, where basic healthcare, clean water and
sanitation facilities are not available… it (the Mars mission)
reflects a remarkable indifference to the dignity of the poor,"
said Harsh Mander, a social activist and director of the Centre
for Equity Studies.
Others have dismissed it as a move by India to outsmart its
neighboring giant China, and move one step closer in its
ambition to be a global superpower. Some reports even
suggested that critics of Britain's aid programme in the country
has also been angered by the mission. The UK gives India
around £300m each year for rehabilitation.
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13. Brinda Adige, director of an NGO called Global Concerns India,
which works on women’s and children’s issues in a slum
population near Bangalore, voiced her disappointment at the
allocation of government funding saying, “So much of money
that is being spent to send a rocket into outer space, when we
know that here on Earth, in our country there are children
dying every day because they have no food to eat…the
priorities are certainly not looking at children, women, human
beings who are in need of basic necessities,” Reported by a
news channel. Supporters, however, argue that the mission is
the cheapest in the world. The Indian space program has
received criticism of this kind from its beginning in 1963.
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14. ISRO has continually had to defend their project in terms of the
beneficial application they can yield to the common Indian
citizen.
However, many Indians believe that investing in science and
technology will benefit the country in the long run by
increasing India’s power in the global economy. ISRO director
Dr. Radhakrishnan told in an interview in January 2014 that
the Mars mission, while not having direct benefits to the
common Indian person, is an investment in the economic
growth of the country that will benefit all of its citizens.
Politicians from across parties expressed excitement regarding
the Mars mission, claiming that this advancement in
science innovation will strengthen India’s position in
the world.
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15. The Indian media has spoken of the underlying political
implications of India’s relationship with China, and how the
Indian space program is creating competition in the
developing world. Reporters have likened this competition to a
21st century version of the earlier space race between the U.S.
Even though India wrestles with many problems from poverty to
hunger, that shouldn't stop the country from forging ahead in
science and space, said B.N. Raghunandan, of the Indian
Institute of Science.
"I don't think we can afford to lag behind. We can't sacrifice
frontier research for the sake of solving old-world problems,"
he said. "These technological advances have their own spinoffs
and benefits."
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16. Investment Attractions:
Two-thirds of the parts for the Indian probe and rocket were
made by domestic firms like Larsen & Toubro, the country’s
largest engineering firm, Godrej & Boyce, and state plane-maker
Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. While such companies have
a long way to go before they can attract big business in the
commercial space sector, years of work on home-grown space
projects are helping them become famous as suppliers of
precision parts for related sectors like defence, aeronautics
and nuclear energy. Larsen & Toubro has made $5.7 million in
parts for ISRO in recent years.
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18. Indian market has to make it attractive for private companies to
enter the satellite manufacturing and launch business. Also
launchers from Russia, India and China are cheaper than that
made in other countries, which creates competition between
the three. India needs to consider significant changes to its
space policy if it wants to create a thriving space industry. By
‘industry’, it means not just companies that supply parts to
ISRO, but also companies that can go out and capture a chunk
of the US$ 160-billion international market.
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19. This low-cost technology could bring in more revenue for India,
say analysts, helping it capture more of the $304 billion global
space market. So far, it has launched 35 satellites for other
countries and is eager to do more.
India is expected to capture at least one-fifth of the world
satellite manufacturing and launch market
"If we're going to earn money, we're going to do it on that," said
D. Raghunandan of the Delhi Science Forum, a group that
promotes the study of science.
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