India moving ahead with space station plans – official

New Delhi has also reportedly made progress on 80 satellites that will relay signals for its manned space flight mission

India is making rapid progress with its plans to establish a space station, a top official from the national space agency has said.

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is also working on 80 satellites that will play key roles in its Gaganyaan crewed space flight mission, Programme Director Imtiyaz Ahmed told the IANS news agency on Monday. The satellites will relay critical signals for the Gaganyaan mission back to Earth, Ahmed told the news agency.

ISRO’s current programs, including earth observation missions, Navigation with Indian Constellation (NVS), the Indian Data Relay Satellite System (IDRSS), Gaganyaan, and the Venus Orbiter Mission, are aimed at expanding the country’s footprint in space science, exploration, and applied technologies.

The agency aims to complete work on a space station by 2035. The first of the five modules for the station will be placed in orbit by 2028.

ISRO’s Gaganyaan Mission, which aims to send a three-member crew on a three-day mission to space and bring them back to Earth, is scheduled for 2027, Chairman V. Narayanan said in January.

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ISRO has planned three uncrewed missions before that, Narayanan said.

New Delhi is also studying the feasibility of placing physical data centers in a low Earth orbit. ISRO is evaluating data processing in space “as part of building futuristic technologies,” Narayanan added.

India launched its heaviest-ever commercial communications satellite in December. ISRO’s Baahubali rocket carried the BlueBird Block-2 communication satellite on behalf of US-based AST SpaceMobile into a low earth orbit.

ISRO aims to triple its annual spacecraft production over the next three years and increase the country’s space economy, currently valued at around $8.2 billion, to $44 billion by 2033.